Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask His Majesty's Government, following the publication on 26 March of Spring Statement 2025: policy costings, how many corrections to benefit claims they have forecasted, and how they made these estimates.

Table 1 shows the estimated corrections to benefit claims associated with the costing entitled “Welfare Fraud and Error: Recruit over 500 new counter fraud and error staff from April 2025”. This costing is described on page 15 of the Spring Statement 2025: Policy Costings document which accompanied the publication of the Spring Statement.

Table 1. Forecast corrections to benefit claims

Caveats:

• Numbers are rounded to the nearest 10,000.
• Corrections to benefit claims includes both overpayments and underpayments.

The methodology underpinning this forecasts is outlined on page 15 of the Spring Statement 2025: Policy Costings document which accompanied the publication of the Spring Statement.

The cost base

The cost base for this measure is estimated using DWP data on performance of current fraud and error programmes and current and forecasted levels of fraud and error in DWP benefits, including national statistics on DWP fraud and error.

Costing

The costing is estimated by taking the performance of the Verify Earnings and Pensions Service and the General Matching Service and applying this to forecasted levels of DWP benefit expenditure. This produces the savings achieved from correcting payments that were incorrect in the past, as well as correcting payments that would have otherwise been incorrect in the future without DWP’s intervention.