The police now have to automatically forward data to social inspection services. This measure will help them to more easily identify unemployed people who are defrauding, De Morgan reported on Saturday. The measure should bring in 5 million euros a year.
Some unemployed people give another address to get more money, the paper explains. They claim to live alone even though they are living with someone, for example. Or claim that they live in Belgium despite living abroad.
The cabinet of the State Secretary against Social Fraud Philippe De Backer (Open Vld) has said address fraud is a huge problem. The ONEM did 20,000 checks between January and September, and 5,000 unemployed people were lying. Some of their allocations were taken away or reduced.
The State Secretary has put in place an automatic collaboration between police and inspection services, which should bring in 5 million euros every year from 2018. “A Witch-hunt was not the idea”, he said. “We want to give social inspection services the necessary instruments to do efficient checks”.
(Source: Belga)
