The National Fraud Initiative is an audit related exercise and is funded through fees charged to audited bodies, so there is no cost to the Department.
The Audit Commission consults audited bodies before it sets its fees scale. As this is an operational matter for the Audit Commission, I will ask its Chief Executive to write to the hon. Member and the answer will be made available in the Library of the House.
Letter from Steve Bundred, dated 24 October 2006:
Your parliamentary question on the estimated cost of the 2006 National Fraud Initiative (NFI) to local authorities has been passed to me for reply.
The NFI is run on a two year cycle, but local authorities are billed annually in order to spread the cost over both years. The cost to local authorities of the current exercise, NFI 2006/07, is set out in the table below.
Authority type 2006 charge 2007 charge Total charge County council 1,175 1,175 2,350 County council with fire authority 1,515 1,515 3,030 London boroughs 1,250 1,250 2,500 Metropolitan borough council 1,175 1,175 2,350 Unitary council 1,000 1,000 2,000 District council—large1 600 600 1,200 District council—medium1 550 550 1,100 District council—small1 500 500 1,000 Police and fire authorities 340 340 680 Probation boards 265 265 530 Passenger transport 250 250 500 Pension authorities (local government) 250 250 500 1 Based on number of housing benefit claimants.
I am copying this to Angela Smith at DCLG and a copy will also be placed in the House of Commons Library.