Stormont 'Protecting Fraudsters Identities'

Benefit fraudsters are being protected - by the same Stormont Department they have ripped off.

The identities of those wrongly taking disability and other allowances are kept under wraps on the Department of Social Development's own website.

While other Stormont bodies provide names, ages and addresses of those taken through the courts in all its media communications, the Department of Social Development (DSD) is failing to follow this practice - and relies on only providing details of individuals to local media.

Now, the Social Development Minister, Alex Attwood, (pictured) has been challenged with a spokesman for the SDLP Executive Minister responding that the Minister "will consider this matter further" after clarification was sought on why DSD doesn't name offenders and only publishes the home area and gender on its main Press website.

A spokeswoman for the Lord Chief Justice said: "This is a matter for the Department of Social Development. It would not be appropriate for the Lord Chief Justice to comment" and a spokeswoman for the Department of Justice at Stormont said it was a matter for the DSD and declined to comment further.

The NI Executive's official website also fails to name names - even where a fraudster has been jailed (see: Man jailed for benefit fraud at Belfast Court).

However, the East Belfast MLA and Stormont Junior Minister, Robin Newton said that justice isn't being served by failing to 'name and shame' the guilty at each available opportunity.

The DUP politician said he was surprised by the DSD spokesman's admission that personal details of individuals convicted of benefit fraud are not put on the website - with details only issued to local media instead.

The long-serving DUP politician - who has previously been Chairman of his local District Policing Partnership - commented: "A significant part of the court's sentencing involves the identity of the guilty being openly available.

"The punishment should fit the crime and for DSD to withhold full disclosure of the names of those who defraud the taxpayer - often out of many thousands of pounds - is unacceptable.

"This information should be freely available and I call on the DSD Minister Alex Attwood to consider this matter as quickly as possible - and change his Department's policy by making full disclosure a matter of course."

Also slamming the measure, Newtownabbey Alliance Councillor Tom Campbell - a practising solicitor - has also questioned why the identity of those convicted in the courts is kept from public scrutiny.

He said: "I cannot understand a reluctance to publish the names of those who have been convicted at a public hearing of fraud and other offences involving the taxpayer being cheated.

"There are sound public policy reasons for publishing this information, the most important of which is to serve as a deterrent to others.

"Other public authorities and Government departments regularly 'name and shame'.

"This is public money being defrauded in these cases and in the interests of transparency the public has a right to know."

Cllr Campbell continued: "I trust that the Minister conducts a review, find the current policy unsatisfactory and contrary to the public interest, and changes it," he concluded.

(BMcC/GK)