Boris Johnson has insisted his government takes online fraud seriously, after he failed to include it in crime statistics.
The prime minister was last week rebuked by a watchdog for claiming crime had fallen by 14%, which is only correct if fraud is excluded.
He was accused by Sir Keir Starmer of “turning a blind eye to scammers” at Prime Minister’s Questions.
Mr Johnson said the government “hates online fraud” and was tackling it.
But he rejected a call by Lib Dem leader Sir Ed Davey to “correct the record on crime figures and apologise”.
Sir Ed said Janet, a 74-year-old woman, had told the BBC she had £25,000 stolen by fraudsters.
“For Janet, and for the four million people who fell victim to fraudsters and scammers last year, fraud is a crime,” he said.
He asked the prime minister if he and his ministers understand the “hurt” they cause fraud victims when they “write them out of the crime figures and dismiss fraud as something people don’t experience in their day-to-day lives”.
Janet was one of 69 known victims of a scam which has seen criminals steal £3.9m since 2018 – but only one of their cases has been investigated, an investigation by BBC Radio 4’s Money Box discovered.
The prime minister said Sir Ed “knows very very well that this government hates fraud, it hates online fraud.”
He added,”We are tackling the scammers by helping people to come forward when they get an email, when they get duped, of course we are helping them in any way that we can.
“But we are also cutting the crime that affects people up and down our country, the neighbourhood crime, dealing with the county lines drugs gangs.”
In last Monday’s Commons debate on Sue Gray’s report on lockdown parties in Downing Street, Mr Johnson said crime had come down by 14%.
But watchdog UK Statistics Authority (UKSA) said the PM “did not make clear” the figure excluded fraud.
SOURCE – BBC
