Part of 1. 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 2:16 pm on 24 January 2017.
Carwyn Jones
Labour
2:16,
24 January 2017
That’s a perfectly fair question, and the answer I give is this: as I said, we have a counter-fraud unit headed by a retired police officer with experience of leading economic crime and proceeds of crime recovery units. He’s also a member of the organising committee for the Wales Fraud Forum. It’s also supported by administration staff. The unit is not a big unit, but it does play a leadership role and draws on considerable support from all audit, assurance and finance professionals. Is it possible to prevent all crime? No, clearly. But what is important is that that crime is detected, investigated and prosecuted, and the fact that there have been instances of investigation is a sign, I hope, that the Member can see that we do take all allegations of fraud seriously, and they are investigated and indeed prosecuted where that’s appropriate.
Ministers make up the Government and almost all are members of the House of Lords or the House of Commons. There are three main types of Minister. Departmental Ministers are in charge of Government Departments. The Government is divided into different Departments which have responsibilities for different areas. For example the Treasury is in charge of Government spending. Departmental Ministers in the Cabinet are generally called 'Secretary of State' but some have special titles such as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Ministers of State and Junior Ministers assist the ministers in charge of the department. They normally have responsibility for a particular area within the department and are sometimes given a title that reflects this - for example Minister of Transport.