To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many people were (a) convicted and (b) acquitted of benefit fraud offences in each of the last three years, broken down by type of offence; how many of those convicted of each type of offence in each year were sentenced to (i) immediate custody and (ii) other disposals, broken down by type of disposal; what the (A) mean average and (B) longest individual custodial sentence imposed in each year was for each type of offence; and if he will make a statement. (73442)

Information regarding types of offence, types of sentence and the length of custodial sentences is not available. The available information is in the following table.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many local authority benefit fraud investigators have (a) commenced and (b) completed the Professionalism in Security Accredited Counter Fraud Officer Scheme. (73443)

Up until the end of March 2006, 1,875 local authority benefit fraud investigators had commenced and completed the Professionalism in Security (PinS) training scheme. In addition a further 80 have started but have not yet completed their training.