YOUR NUMBER'S UP!

0 Comments | Sunday Mirror, Jul 28, 1996 | by FRANK FIELD

I suggested last week the need to introduce DNA testing to safeguard the National Insurance number system.

These numbers are allocated to everyone at the age of 16 - and are the gateway to claiming benefit payments.

But when I suggested DNA tests for everyone, all hell broke out.

Accusations abounded that such a move was, at best, an introduction of the big brother state, and, at worst, a new form of Nazism.

What was interesting was that all these comments were addressed to a reform I was not advocating.

I had not suggested the introduction of an ID card. Nor was I insisting that it was imperative for everyone to carry around these cards all day and take them to bed at night.

The starting point for this suggested reform has been the findings of my Social Security Select Committee on systematic, widescale, organised criminal fraud operated against the social security budget. Paying for this budget costs each worker on average pounds 75 a week.

The Commons committee, which I chair, has been examining housing benefit fraud. The London Borough of Haringey reported their survey on landlords which showed that, for some landlords, bogus claims run at 66 per cent.

More millionaires are created by the housing benefit system than by the National Lottery.

But even more importantly, the committee's investigations into housing benefit fraud opened our eyes to the near breakdown of security surrounding our NI numbers.

At birth each of us is allotted an NHS number. At 16 we gain our NI number.

It all sounds very simple. The trouble is that the Government has been issuing these NI numbers as though they were Smarties.

There are now over 15 million more numbers than there are people eligible. Of course some people who have died. Others have gone abroad.

But, if only one in 15 spare numbers is being used to commit fraud, we taxpayers are stumping up sums beyond the dreams of avarice to keep criminals in the standard of living they have become accustomed to.

It was the evidence we had on the sophistication of the fraud which has led me to suggest that DNA testing will be needed to clean up the NI number system.

Anti-fraud officers reported on raids they had carried out: 24 faked identities in one room, all with NI numbers, and 37 faked identities in the next, all with NI numbers. The NI frauds were linked to - among other things - false MOTs and credit card crime.

The dimensions of the assault on welfare became apparent.

We should no longer think of social security fraud as a single mum with a live-in boyfriend, or the out-of- work dad taking jobs on the side.

That of course happens. But social security fraud is now big business. It is highly-organised and, as with other frauds, organised on a systematic and serious basis.

But here is the rub. We are dealing with a large number of sophisticated fraudsters working in groups or gangs. They have already kidded their way into getting bucketfuls of NI identities.

Any ordinary attempts to check the validity of each number is likely to be thwarted. Enter the DNA test, which gives a unique record of a person's identity. All that is needed for this genetic fingerprinting is a simple blood test taken at birth with other routine tests.

Here, I thought, is a means of securing the safety of the entry point into the welfare state.

Three moves would be required:

First, we could exclude pensioners. There is very little evidence yet of fraud here. Pensioners could, however, if they wished, join the scheme. Many would be anxious to show that, being honest, they have nothing to fear.

Second, we will need to register each person into the system when they are born. Instead of an NHS number we would be allocated our NI number which would cover us for health purposes. A DNA test should be taken at birth along with all the other tests which are now merely a routine.

And thirdly, the more difficult task - but the most rewarding for taxpayers - would be to start a trawl taking each letter of the alphabet. Every one of us would be required to offer a DNA test. This would then be matched against our NI number.

At the end of the process there would be a huge mountain of unclaimed numbers. Fraudsters foolish enough to try to regain possession of all the identities they are currently using would single themselves out for special attention. DNA testing is expensive at the moment. But the gains from benefit savings will far outweigh this.

Moreover, as National Insurance is the growth area of fraud, the blocking off of even larger criminal activity will further safeguard the taxpayers" purse.

This DNA information will need to be protected - I have suggested by a special commission - to prevent its misuse.

But once in existence the debate would open up on the circumstances under which the DNA data should be used for other purposes.

Should it be used to fight other forms of serious crime? There will be powerful voices for such a move.

Suzy Lamplugh's mother, Diane, has written in support of building up a national DNA register.

Writing 10 years after her daughter was abducted, the last words go to her: