A leading academic known for his investigative work into the 1989 Hillsborough disaster has been named as a keynote speaker at this year's British Society of Criminology (BSC) Conference.

Professor Phil Scraton, criminologist and author from Queen's University Belfast, will be a plenary speaker at the UK's most prestigious criminology conference, which this year is being held at Sheffield Hallam University (July 4 - 7).

The conference, titled 'Forging Social Justice: Local Challenges, Global Complexities', is expected to attract hundreds of practitioners, policy makers, academics and students from the criminology community across the world. 

Property industry professionals have been urged to be extra vigilant in the wake of recent research that highlighted a 50% increase in mortgage and property transaction fraud in the past year.

Aziz Rahman (pictured), Senior Partner at corporate fraud defence specialists Rahman Ravelli, stressed that “the stakes are too high for those in property to simply plod on, oblivious to the risks” as an Experian study revealed that fraud is becoming more commonplace across the sector.

The research estimated that an average of £76,166 is lost in each example of mortgage or property transaction fraud.

With criminals coming up with increasingly sophisticated methods to defraud, Mr Rahman has warned those who are involved in property deals - from estate agents and surveyors to mortgage brokers and developers - to look out for red flags.

In December, the National Audit Office reported HMRC estimates that losses to tax fraud amount to £16bn each year. That is nearly half of HMRC’s estimate of its tax gap of £34bn – the difference between the amount of tax HMRC should collect each year and the amount it actually collects.

The report was the first in a series which will evaluate how effectively HMRC tackles different aspects of tax fraud – a longstanding problem not only for HMRC but for tax administrations around the world. Reducing the amount of tax that is lost due to tax fraud is a high priority for HMRC. To do that it will need to make better use of its data and develop its analysis.

The Independent Fraud Advisory Panel has called for a review of official statistics to improve efforts to fight fraud. The watchdog wants the government to review the method used to collect official fraud statistics and warns that the new pension reforms could provide another avenue for unscrupulous fraudsters to target the elderly.

Speaking in July, its chairman David Kirk said: "Incomplete statistics leave fraud victims disadvantaged and hide the true level of economic crime in this country. Without a sound understanding of the amount of fraud and who it is hurting, adequate police resources cannot be applied to tackling the problem.

"The system for collecting fraud statistics remains fundamentally flawed, and unless the true value is revealed the Home Office is unlikely to step up its efforts in this area.