The Department for Work and Pensions is preparing for a major crackdown on fraud and error in the welfare system under the Labour Party government. But the DWP has been warned by campaigners: “At what cost?”

The Big Issue, a leading UK publication, reports human rights campaigners fear that the government’s methods for tackling fraud and error in the benefits system could have ‘devastating consequences’.

Jen Clark, economic, cultural and social rights lead at Amnesty International UK said: “The obsessive focus on benefit fraud from consecutive governments has been key to creating our consciously cruel social security system.”

Ayla Ozmen, director of policy and engagement at anti-poverty charity Z2K, said: “While we support efforts to drive down fraud and error in the benefits system, we have serious concerns about some of the measures the government is introducing as part of its plan to tackle this.

“Given that DWP decision-making when it comes to suspected overpayments is often poor, we fear that proposals to require banks to share information about claimants’ accounts could lead to people in clear financial need having their payments wrongly stopped.

"We are calling for the government to introduce proper safeguards to ensure no one faces the risk of being pushed into destitution by this measure.”

Rick Burgess, of the Greater Manchester Coalition of Disabled People, said: “The conflation of error and fraud into one figure is a long term problem the DWP seems unwilling to resolve. It also serves a political function to provide a narrative for further surveillance, harsher rules and punishments, and cuts to social security.

“We need a supportive social security system, instead what we have got is a shadow penal system for people in poverty. It is being normalised that people receiving DWP awards have fewer human rights than the rest of the population, our bank accounts will be spied on and we lose the right to privacy.

“The pathological prioritising of fraud narratives is part of justifying abuse by the DWP, it is a distraction from the inadequacy of benefits and the continuing cover up of deaths caused by the system.”

Clark argues that automation and AI are “making this significantly worse, with little oversight and devastating consequences”.

“People are wrongly flagged for fraud, sanctioned due to system glitches, and pushed into financial crisis by flawed algorithms,” Clark said.

“Needing to rely on social security is something that could happen to any of us and that we all have a right to. If the government needs to raise money it should prioritise taxing those with the broadest shoulders, rather than trampling over the basic rights of those who are in need.”