New measures aimed at cracking down on benefit fraud will give investigators “direct access” to people’s bank accounts.

This comes after chancellor Rachel Reeves announced this week that the Department for Work and Pensions will be given enhanced legal powers and more resources for anti-fraud work.

Bolton has seen several high-profile fraud cases in recent years, connected to both benefits payments and to other institutions. 

Conservative group leader Cllr Martyn Cox said: “One of the key things that deters people is when they see that someone who has committed fraud has been caught, prosecuted and jailed.

“And so when they are not caught, they are not brought to trial and they are not jailed then people will think they are going to get away with it.”

DWP investigators will get enhanced powersDWP investigators will get enhanced powers (Image: PA)

He added: “I think it’s important that in cases like these a suspect is brought to trial and dealt with quickly.”

The crackdown on fraud announced by Labour’s Rachel Reeves will, she says, focus particularly on criminal gangs orchestrating offences like these.

Addressing the House of Commons last Wednesday, Ms Reeves said that this was one of several measures that would help make welfare spending more sustainable.

She said: “We will expand DWP’s counter-fraud teams using innovative new methods to prevent illegal activity and provide new legal powers to crackdown on fraudsters, including direct access to bank accounts to recover debt. 

“This package saves £4.3 billion a year by the end of the forecast.”

ALSO READ: Woman 'illegally and naively' received more than £50,000 in fraudulent benefits

ALSO READ: Woman fraudulently claimed tens of thousands of pounds of benefits over years

ALSO READ: Oven repairman cooks up a £57,000 benefits fraud

But campaigners have warned that measures like this could in effect mean that banks are asked to “spy on benefits recipients.”

Silkie Carlo, of Big Brother Watch, said: “Everyone wants fraud to be dealt with, and the government already has strong powers to investigate the bank statements of suspects.

“But to force banks to constantly spy on benefits recipients without suspicion means that not only millions of disabled people, pensioners and carers will be actively spied on but the whole population’s bank accounts are likely to be monitored for no good reason.

 “A financial snooper’s charter targeted to automate suspicion of our country’s poorest is intrusive, unjustified and risks Horizon-style injustice on a mass scale.”