The Department for Work and Pensions’ own staff have stolen money that is meant to be for benefits claimants, which includes people who are unemployed, disabled or pensioners.
More than £600,0000 was lost because of benefits-related fraud carried out by DWP employees and contract staff in 2025-26.
Though the figure is down on the £1.7m lost to fraud the previous year, it brings the total amount of money stolen by benefits workers over the past five years to around £4m.
Shorts
The DWP said that robust controls had seen “the amount of taxpayer money stolen through internal benefit fraud in 2025-2026 stand at less than a half of what it was in 2024-25”.
