UK Economic Crime Tops What Gov’t Spends to Fight It, Data Shows

A report from anti-graft charity Spotlight on Corruption says economic crime in the U.K. ends up costing the government “hundreds of times more” than the government spends fighting it, according to a Financial Times report Sunday (Jan. 23).

The Spotlight on Corruption report goes on to say there should be a new fund to help out with budget cuts.

The report says the U.K. government spends £825 million ($1.1 billion) on the budgets every year for national agencies fighting economic crime. However, this pales in estimation to the £190 billion ($258 billion) lost to fraud and the £100 billion ($135.6 billion) spent fighting money laundering.

The authorities seemed to be “overstretched and outgunned” by criminals.

According to Spotlight, the problem comes down to the fact that the money given to government fighting of fraud came out to 0.09% of the government spending, while the money lost from those crimes ended up coming out to 14.5% of the gross domestic product.

Susan Hawley, executive director for Spotlight, said the U.K. government needs to make a new central economic crime fighting fund, which would come through reinvesting some of the revenue from law enforcement back into the work.

“With law enforcement so under resourced and the costs of economic crime so high, this should be a no brainer,” Hawley said, per the FT report.

Recently, the U.K.’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) took fraud fighting in a different direction, rolling out an “anti fraud jingle” over the holidays. It was “designed to be a lighthearted, engaging way to spread awareness of loan fee fraud advice to consumers” over Christmas.

See also: UK Regulators Turn to Anti-Fraud Jingle to Thwart Holiday Loan Scams

The song was put out in partnership with behavioral scientists Influence At Work and music production company Soviet Science.

Mark Steward, the executive director for enforcement and market oversight with the FCA, said the Christmas lockdown had messed with normal in-person get-togethers, so people “deserve to celebrate this year’s festive period in style.”

“It’s a sad fact that scammers will be seeking every opportunity to exploit vulnerable people through loan fee fraud,” Steward said.