The commission says tenancy fraud has the potential to do the most damage Almost 120,000 frauds costing £135m were uncovered by English councils last year, the Audit Commission has said.
Its annual fraud survey found 63,000 false benefit claims, and estimated that 50,000 properties worth £2bn had been illegally sub-let or occupied.
Dishonest claims for the 25% single person council tax discount were up and there were also 4,000 fraudulent uses of disabled parking badges, it added.
The quango warned that local government job cuts may weaken fraud controls.
‘Minute scale’
Its survey – entitled Protecting the Public Purse – revealed that false benefit claims were the most prevalent type of fraud against local authorities.
But it said tenancy fraud – where people live in council houses to which they are not entitled, or illegally sub-let them – has the potential to do the most damage.
Local government correspondent Greg Wood said that, in terms of total council spending, the scale of the detected fraud was minimal.
The commission is one of 192 public bodies being abolished by the coalition government, which said its cull of quangos would improve accountability and cut costs.
The annual survey of how much fraud is costing local taxpayers will be discontinued as a result.
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