Toolkit on tackling error, fraud and corruption in social protection programs

The World Bank commissioned RAND Europe to write a toolkit to assist in the assessment of interventions used to tackle error, fraud and corruption (EFC) in the social protection programmes of client countries. This report is aimed at assisting government officials who seek to improve EF&C control in their social protection programmes and World Bank staff in assessing EF&C control in client countries. It is a discussion piece that informs the wider debate on ensuring the integrity of social protection programmes. The toolkit builds on a report that RAND Europe undertook on fraud and error controls in social security systems of eight OECD countries for the UK National Audit Office (NAO) and is based on three recent missions that the World Bank and contractors have undertaken in the social security systems of the Ukraine, the Kyrgyz Republic and Bangladesh. The focus of the toolkit is particularly focused on fraud and error in social protection programmes and to a smaller degree on corruption. This report contains the written materials for a diagnostic toolkit aimed at the assessment of the mechanisms for combating EFC. It contains five substantive sections: an introduction; a discussion on building a framework to combat EFC; examples of effective instruments used to combat EFC; a section on how to set up a diagnostic missions; and examples from missions so far. The document is organised along a set of questions that an evaluator of EFC in social protection programmes might consider.