Fraud

• Postal voting pilots ‘well-run’, electoral commission says

  Pilot schemes for postal and proxy voters carried out during last May’s local elections were ‘well-run’, an electoral body has concluded.

  

• Five people sentenced for £200k council fraud

  Five men who defrauded a Leicestershire council out of more than £200,000 through an email scam have been sentenced.

  

• Councils sue Barclays over controversial LOBO loans

  Barclays are being sued by 14 local authorities over allegations it committed fraud over loans to councils.

  

• Voter ID in perspective

  Jo Miller, in her role as a returning officer, argues that Voter ID is a very expensive way to tackle a problem that is not a top priority in the UK.

  

• Mandatory ID ‘disenfranchises’ voters, electoral watchdog says

  Electoral watchdogs have rejected a claim that a recent trial requiring voters to show ID was 'a great success'.

  

• Whitehall defends voter ID reform against accusations of ‘discrimination’

  The Government has defended its plans to require voters to produce ID when voting after watchdog warned reform may discriminate against ethnic minorities.

  

• Council employee exploited systems ‘failures’ to steal £1m

  Failures in ‘fundamental controls’ within Dundee City Council’s financial systems allowed a former employee to steal £1m from the authority, auditors conclude.

  

• Cuts to trading standards putting older people at risk of fraud, warns charity

  Cuts to trading standards services are leaving millions of older people at risk of fraud, according to Age UK.

  

• Dismissed council employee pleads guilty to fraud

  A former civil enforcement supervisor at Reading council has been issued a 17-week suspended jail sentence after admitting to fraud.

  

• Voter ID trials are ‘unnecessary and over-bearing’ say campaigners

  The Government has been urged to reconsider its ID voting trials by campaigners due to the ‘tiny’ amount of electoral fraud.