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<p>The Department is committed to bringing fraudsters to justice. Last year we, working
alongside local authorities, recovered more than £1.1bn in fraud and error across
all benefits and brought almost 5,000 prosecutions in 2017/18.</p><p> </p><p>As of
June 2019, the Department has received around 42,000 fraud referrals from staff relating
to potential fraudulent advance claims, which equates to less than 1 per cent of all
Universal Credit claims.</p><p> </p><p>Our investigations are ongoing and we are therefore
unable to provide details of how many may have used another person’s identity to make
their claim, or to quantify the amount spent on investigations of this type. However,
any cases in which this has occurred will be treated accordingly, with the continued
use of both prosecutions and tough financial penalties to deter this fraudulent behaviour.</p><p>
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