Get the stories that matter to you sent straight to your inbox with our daily newsletter. Subscribe Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Invalid Email

The Tories’ benefits sanctions regime costs £153million more a year to run than it saves.

A shocking official report has revealed that administering the discredited system costs taxpayers up to £285million a year.

And the brutal cuts that make life hell for struggling families only save around £132million.

Staggeringly, the Department for Work and Pensions do not track the cost of sanctions or use their own data to evaluate their impact.

In their scathing report, the National Audit Office said they “cannot conclude that the department is achieving value for money”.

Last night, opposition MPs demanded that Ministers get a grip of the sanctions system.

Labour’s Meg Hillier said: “Benefit sanctions punish some of the poorest people in the country but despite the anxiety and misery they cause, it seems to be pot luck who gets sanctioned.

“While studies suggest sanctions do encourage some people back into work, other people stop claiming but do not start working and the DWP have no record of them.

“If vulnerable people fall through the safety net, what happens to them?”

The DWP spend up to £50million a year applying sanctions and £200million checking that claimants meet the conditions for receiving payments.

(Image: Phil Dye/Daily Record)

The NAO also estimate that the DWP forked out £35million in hardship payments last year and withheld £132million following sanctions.

The NAO said nearly a quarter of jobseeker’s allowance claimants received at least one sanction in the five years to 2015. A four-week penalty for the over-25s means a £300 loss.

More than a million unemployed benefits claimants have to meet certain conditions – such as showing they are looking for work – to receive their payments.

But the report found the use of penalties differs across jobcentres and employment schemes.

Some Work Programme providers make more than twice as many sanction referrals as others dealing with similar groups.

And the NAO said more than a quarter of Work Programme claimants hit by sanctions last year had the decisions overturned, compared to 11 per cent of jobcentre penalties.

Lib Dem leader Tim Farron said: “This report is a civil service equivalent of a character assassination. It shows that a failing department is trying to prop up a discredited system.

“The DWP have turned this system in a postcode lottery that means someone could be sanctioned in one place and not in another for the same thing.

“What is worse is that the Government are not assessing the impact of sanctions, using their own data to see what is going on, and they are not even tracking the benefits.

“Ministers need to get a grip.”

Child Poverty Action Group chief executive Alison Garnham said: “As the NAO report makes clear, the DWP have little idea what impact sanctions have on individuals and, with some areas imposing twice as many sanctions as others, appear to have little concern for consistency.

“Sanctions create destitution but the DWP are operating almost blind.”

A DWP spokesman said: “This report fails to recognise the improvements we have made to sanctions. The number has fallen and they are only used as a last resort.

“We will consider the recommendations and respond fully in due course.”

The sums

Costs

Applying sanctions - £50m

Monitoring claimants - £200m

Hardship payments - £35m

Savings

Sanctioned payments - £132m

Balance sheet

£285m - £132m = £153m loss