Agenda item

This report provides an account of fraud-related activity during the first half of the financial year to minimise the risk of fraud, bribery and corruption occurring within and against the Council.

Andy Hyatt (Head of Fraud) introduced the report, which gave an overview of the counter-fraud activities that had been undertaken in the first six month of the financial year. The report also gave a summary of the reasons for case closure. Most cases were closed after finding a National Fraud Initiative data match, indicating no fraud and false positives. Activities were lower in some areas, which was not unusual given the summer holidays. It was also noted that eviction processes were influenced by resource issues for bailiffs.

One of the focuses of the team was tenancy fraud. While there were eight successfully recovered properties, there were more cases which were due to be heard in court. The Council’s Director of Legal Services had reached out to courts to try and resolve this issue. There was reduction in Right to Buy and the team had resources to verify all the applications and carry out due diligence. Officers working on Right to Buy could soon move to support tenancy fraud checks.

The team was also planning to undertake some proactive work on temporary accommodation. There is someone working on inputting data from Hammersmith & Fulham, Westminster City Council and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea into the Fraud Hub, which would help target temporary accommodation fraud. The team was also working with Human Resources to explore using the Fraud Hub against the issue of dual working.

Sharon Lea (Chief Executive) expressed that social housing fraud was a serious issue because it was a loss of homes for families in need of accommodation. Despite efforts of the Fraud team, homes were not being recovered quickly enough due to backlogs in courts. It was a priority for the Council to lobby with other local authorities to cut down this backlog.

Councillor Lisa Homan asked what the situation was like in other London boroughs in relation to the backlog of housing issues in courts, and whether the tenancies identified were mostly housing associations or council tenancies.

On the first question, Andy Hyatt replied that the whole London was experiencing the same problems. Westminster City Council and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea were both struggling the same way with higher numbers. As part of the London Boroughs' Fraud Investigators' Group, he noted that there was an opportunity to lobby as a London voice and he was in contact with the Local Government Association as well.

On the second question, Andy Hyatt noted that a majority of the identified tenancies were council tenancies. There was also a memorandum of understanding between the Council and a number of housing associations stating that if there was a good enough case, the Council could offer investigative resources on the basis that if the property was recovered, there would be an additional nomination of a property of the same size for the Council.

Cllr Homan enquired how many housing association cases might be missing. Andy Hyatt replied that he would explore this further and discuss with housing associations altogether.

ACTION: Andy Hyatt

Councillor Florian Chevoppe-Verdier pointed out that the structural failure in the justice system had prevented the fraud strategy to be implemented in full. It was noted that the upcoming Data Bill had a focus on tackling identity fraud, and the Council was being visionary for already carrying that work out. He also raised the issue of council housing being sublet and asked if there was anything the Council was doing to support innocent subtenants if there was a repossession.

Andy Hyatt replied that some of the subtenants were afraid of speaking out against their ‘landlords’ because of fear for personal safety. The team would link them with the Safer Neighbourhood team and the Housing department to point them to the right resources. The support that the Council could offer was often limited but Housing Solutions would try to help them as best they could.

Cllr Chevoppe-Verdier noted that there might not be an existing solution, but this issue was worth looking at as subtenants could find themselves without a home very quickly and it might be in the wider interest of the Council to help the subtenants find a place to stay.

Andy Hyatt noted that there was a case in another local authority where an agreement was made for six weeks. He assured that he would bring this to Housing colleagues and explore if there was any support they could offer, such as reaching out and giving the subtenants options as early as possible. It would also be beneficial from the anti-fraud perspective if those subtenants were more likely to cooperate with the Council.

ACTION: Andy Hyatt

Councillor Adrian Pascu-Tulbure asked if there was any developing trend of fraud that the Committee should be aware of. Andy Hyatt replied that lately it had been spotted that people were falsifying documentation to give themselves a new persona, such as fake utility bills. The team was exploring the use of technology in spotting these fraudulent documents. Apart from that, most types of frauds were traditional, such as doorstep frauds and general phishing.

Referring to an example in the report about a resident possessing two parking permits for the same vehicle, Cllr Homan asked if the permit was renewed fraudulently. Andy Hyatt said that the original permit holder moved out and had not cancelled it. It was more a prevention exercise than fraud detection.

Cllr Chevoppe-Verdier enquired if staff received trainings about recent trends in fraud such as deepfakes. Andy Hyatt responded that staff received regular training, and the leadership was still learning and understanding deepfakes in order to identify how best to inform staff on the topic. The most useful advice would still be not to take anything at face value, double check with the source and verify with other approved sources. The Fraud Hub would allow all departments to carry out basic checks with data across all local authorities in the UK and with more updated information from the Hub. Therefore, the team’s current focus was facilitating officers to use the Hub, which linked to parts of the anti-fraud strategy on helping people to understand what they could do when they identify fraud and how fraud occurred.

RESOLVED

That the Committee noted and commented on the report.