When director of public prosecutions Kier Starmer announced he was increasing prison sentences for benefit fraud, he justified the step by saying: "We all pay the price."

If Starmer wants to find the crooks that have cost us all money and pain, he is looking in the wrong place.

While Starmer plays tough guy with some small fry who cheated a little extra benefit, a vast gang of criminals who have made us all pay a very high price have evaded the DPP's grasp.

There have been almost no British arrests for banking fraud, even though the very wide series of false accounts, cooked books and economic cheating have thrown the whole world system into a deep recession.

Somebody who lies about their dole is already much more likely to go to prison than somebody who lies about, say, fiddling the Libor rate.

Starmer said he runs 8,600 prosecutions for benefit fraud every year.

But Starmer's Crimebusters are so busy cornering dangerous dole-snatchers that they have no time to visit the City.

Take the case of Barclays. It cheated hundreds of thousands of people with crooked "PPI" insurance deals.

Then it lied about the key Libor banking rate.

Then it hid £322 million of secret "commissions" that it paid in Qatar in return for an £8 billion investment that kept Barclays afloat.

This kind of pattern suggests that Barclays is involved in systematic lawbreaking.

Is it a financial organisation or a crime organisation?

Barclays has been fined. It has had to repay a lot of money. But nobody has been sent to prison.

In the case of the Qatari payments, the Financial Conduct Authority suggests it may fine Barclay's £50m for keeping them secret.

But hidden commissions should always be checked to see if they are actually bribes.

Any serious prosecutor would be raiding offices and making arrests.

But while the DPP announces a crackdown on benefit fraud, banking frauds are still treated like indiscretions among gentlemen.

So far only three people have been charged for fixing the Libor banking rate in Britain.

First, bankers manipulated this key banking rate so they could earn extra millions on trading.

Then bankers fixed the rate to make their firms look a lot healthier than they were. 

Even though top officials at banks like Barclays - up to board level - admitted fixing Libor, the few prosecutions have concentrated on lower-level traders and brokers from smaller firms.

Benefit fraud is mostly the opportunistic work of desperate individuals.

But banking fraud is organised crime. It involves large networks of powerful individuals who work together to break the law.

Let's look beyond Barclays at the broader banking sector. A recent article in the Wall Street Journal gives a flavour of the Libor fixing.

The article, a terrific piece by David Enrich and Jean Eaglesham, appeared this May under the headline "Clubby London trading scene fostered Libor rate-fixing scandal."

The clubs involved seem less like a traditional London gentleman's club and more like those run by Tony Soprano.

The article focuses on the way brokers and bankers from separate firms worked together to fix Libor.

Instead of competing, staff in different banks worked together to fiddle the rate, with brokers as intermediaries.

The deals were oiled with sleazy favours.

The Wall Street Journal says that witnesses knew brokers from Tullet Prebon took an RBS banker "to London strip clubs and spent long weekends with him in Las Vegas."

Tullet Prebon says that it is co-operating with authorities and has not been accused of any crime.

These are rich, powerful and well-connected people.

Business Minister and Tory deputy chairman Michael Fallon only stood down from the board of Tullet Prebon at the start of this month.

But they and other brokers and bankers act like low-lives.

Some of the favours didn't involve naked women. The Wall Street Journal reports that a different brokerage firm "dispatched limousines to the homes of top traders at London banks.

The limos ferried the traders' wives and girlfriends to a helicopter, which flew them to the Royal Ascot for a day of horse races."

Some favours were encouraged with high-end family fun.

But there were also special sleazy treats for the money men, according to the Wall Street Journal.

"Brokers hired prostitutes for traders and took the traders to an outfit called Lady Marmalade Adult Parties ... The website of Lady Marmalade says it operates from a four-bedroom apartment in central London, equipped with an 'erotic love swing' promising customers 'an orgasmic time'."

This sounds like organised crime, but according to the Financial Services Authority it isn't.

The FSA spokesman told the Wall Street Journal: "There aren't specific rules about whether you can send your clients to go see prostitutes."

So Starmer wants to crack down on benefit claimants because he says: "It is a myth that 'getting one over on the system' is a victimless crime."

We were all victims of the bankers' crimes far more than the benefit fraudsters.

And according to the WSJ, London's financial centre is awash with vice.

It says: "Brokers routinely reward valued traders by returning a percentage of their commissions in the form of entertainment.

"Brokers have paid for traders to spend weekends in the Alps and Saint Tropez and, on occasion, have even bought them cocaine or prostitutes."

So the City looks like Sin City, where crimes are planned in dens of iniquity.

But Starmer thinks we need to crack down on the poor.

When dodgy benefit claimants start taking their dole officers to Saint Tropez to stuff coke up their noses and send hookers to their rooms, I'll join in with Starmer's crusade.

Solomon Hughes