[jambutty]

Originally Posted by andrewb

Are you disagreeing that it will take at least 150 years to pay back or not? The only difference error would make would be to extend the 150 years, and further reinforce my point.

Are you working this out, or just taking the view on a principled stand that I lumped them together therefore I cannot have an exact figure? If it's the latter then you haven't taken the effort to realise I have used the most conservative figures, and yet it still backs up what I said.

Another politician’s ruse. Deflect attention from the point in question by bringing in something new rather than admit that the point in question was at best inaccurate and at worst downright spin. I made no comment about the 150 years argument and I don’t intend to.

Lumping two statistics under one umbrella is always suspicious and makes me wonder what is being hidden.

In this case you stated that it costs us £2.6 billion in benefit fraud and errors. All I wanted to know is how much was down to fraud and how much was down to errors.

Let us suppose that £2 billion was down to error and only £0.6 to fraud. That wouldn’t give the pro ID cards brigade a case to back up their pro ID arguments seeing as the bulk of it is based on anti fraud, would it? But it would give the anti ID lot ammunition to accuse the government of incompetence in their departments.

Now I’m not going to argue this point with you any more. I’ve made my position clear.