30 July 2010
Eighty-five per cent of the claims put in by councils for housing and council tax benefits subsidy were inaccurate, according to the local government spending watchdog.
The Audit Commission examined councils’ claims for funding from Whitehall for central government schemes such as Sure Start and teachers’ pensions. The claims also include money for local authority-administered housing and council tax benefits. The commission also checked the financial returns submitted by councils to central government.
The Local government
claims and returns 2008/09 report, published yesterday, found errors
amounting to £54.5m of the £45.6bn audited. Of this £45.6bn, 82% was made up of
housing and council tax benefits and the national non-domestic rates return.
The report said the complexity of the housing and council tax benefits systems and the large number of claims and transactions made meant there was a lot of scope for error. Common problems included data entry mistakes and difficulties with the documents needed to support benefit payments.
The report also revealed that the number of qualification letters issued by auditors to authorities increased from 626 in 2007/08 to 673 in 2008/09. The commission said this showed authorities needed to improve their claims and returns procedures.
Martin Evans, the Audit Commission’s managing director of audit, said: ‘We’ve made sure claims and returns were completed properly and pointed out where the amounts claimed or reported were based on inaccurate information.
‘The big picture shows the amendments are worth millions of pounds, albeit a small percentage of the billions of pounds claimed.’
