It is to the Conservative's credit that they want to stamp out fraud when it comes to spending as long as the cost isn't higher than the monies being scammed. I thought that we proved during Mike Harris' reign that number of beer swilling, cigarette drinking taking a cab to the beer store the day the welfare cheque arrives individual is a very, very small group and that they would probably vote liberal anyway.
Ottawa on lookout for child benefit fraud
Updated Sun. Mar. 18 2007 7:51 PM ET
Canadian Press
OTTAWA -- The federal government is stepping up efforts to find phantom children after auditors determined the Canada Revenue Agency is lax about policing fraud in its $9-billion child-benefit programs.
A new report says the agency must do more to ensure monthly cheques sent to needy families are not for the support of "potentially non-existent children.''
"Compliance controls in place ... need to be improved to adequately manage the risk of erroneous payments,'' says an internal audit report, completed in November last year.
As a result, the agency plans to start verifying birth records, to use computers to analyze suspicious activity and to draw on newly available 2006 census data to help identify phoney claims.
The auditors examined the Canada Child Tax Benefit and the GST and HST credit, which are available only to low- and modest-income families and residents.
The monthly child benefit last year paid $9.3 billion for 5.3 million kids younger than 18, under a complex formula that takes into account family income. The GST-HST credit was worth $3.3 billion last year and went to 9.5 million lower-income people in quarterly payments. Both programs are tax-free.
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