Despite the fraud from the state due to a lack of controls in government ‘bounce back’ loans and the furlough scheme – in the UK and similarly in others where government offered support – the UK government counter-fraud figure Mark Cheesman told an online event today that he has never been more confident, ‘that we can make an impact’. Mark, deputy director, public sector fraud, at the Cabinet Office, was among the speakers at the FinCrime World Forum.
He gave three reasons. First, collaboration. He said he had never seen so much, ‘and it has led to much bigger impacts and things happening much more quickly.” Next came confidence: “We should be confident, all of us working in financial crime should be confident in the value we add. We are adding value in difficult areas, we are making a difference.” He gave the example of the bounce back loan scheme (as featured in a recent report by the official National Audit Office (NAO), featured in the December 2020 print edition of Professional Security magazine). A bounce back counter-fraud tool has saved £10m; few people, he said, can make that difference and put that money back into public services ‘and things that matter to our communities’.
He also took solace from being part of a ‘wider counter fraud community’. He spoke also of having many more ‘difficult conversations that we might not have had before – ‘come on, we need to do something about this”.
His message was that ‘good financial crime investments yield financial outputs; these are cost benefits, ‘spend to save’; where it is done well, it is good and it results in financial outcomes.’ He gave an Australian example of fraud investment case guidance, as released during the recent international fraud awareness week run by the counter-fraud trade body ACFE. Other countries including the UK will be using that tool, he predicted.
Earlier he said of the ‘challenging times’ that ‘we are part-way through fighting the initial crisis, which is the virus itself; we will now move on; we all hope for a vaccine but we will then be fighting the crisis of the economy. This is not a short term thing.”
The session, chaired by Helena Wood of the defence and security think-tank RUSI, also heard from Chris Felton of the City of London Police, the UK police force responsible for economic crime; and Mike Haley of the anti-fraud trade association Cifas.
