DWP poised to carry out bank account checks on four 'major' benefits

The DWP will launch a bank account crackdown as it tries to recoup fraud.

The Department for Work and Pensions is poised to carry out benefit checks on people who claim four payouts from the Department for Work and Pensions. The DWP will launch a bank account crackdown as it tries to recoup fraud.

People claiming major benefits will likely be the target of new fraud checks introduced by the new Labour Party government. DWP staff will be granted fresh powers to check the bank accounts of recipients who claim at least one of the four major benefit programmes

Universal Credit is likely to be the focus for fraud investigators as it is one of the mostly widely claimed benefits with a savings threshold of £16,000. Other benefits that may be looked at include Jobseeker's Allowance, Employment and Support Allowance, and Housing Benefit, the Sun newspaper reports.

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“No one should have their bank accounts looked into without very good reason. However, this is what these surveillance powers will allow, threatening everyone’s financial privacy in the process,” said Susannah Copson, legal and policy officer at Big Brother Watch, handing in the petition at 10 Downing Street.

“In the event that these algorithmic monitoring systems go wrong, it will be the elderly, the disabled, and the poor most at risk. We’re witnessing the makings of another Horizon scandal, but on a staggering scale.” Marion Fellows, previously the SNP’s spokesperson for disabilities, warned that the bill would “decimate civil liberties”.

“It’s a very slippery slope,” she told the Big Issue. “It’s not just the people who are receiving benefits, but those who rent to them, their friends or family, anyone involved with them. This is just an insidious way to actually track people who have given no cause for surveillance.

“And the really worrying point for me is that I don’t think the incoming Labour government – and I think there’s no doubt they will form the government – will do anything about it.”