Drug users and benefits

Rye MP Michael Foster is calling on Tories to back the Government's plans to stop benefits for crack and heroin addicts who refuse drug treatment programmes.

Up to 1,786 crack and heroin addicts in East Sussex get benefits with no questions asked.

We should not let tax payers' money line the pockets of drugs dealers.

Traditionally Labour has defended benefits for drug addicts, on the grounds that they have other health problems.

This tougher line must be right. If they want someone else to pay for their drugs habits, let them find a charity, rather than taking money from taxpayers.

Where are the deterrent sentences for benefit fraud?

A Lancashire woman who fraudulently obtained more than £17,000 in tax credits has received a suspended jail term.

A Selby area man who pleaded guilty to falsely claiming nearly £4,000 in benefits has been fined £390 and ordered to pay £500 in costs.

Tracey Rimmer, from St Helens, falsely claimed benefits totalling £4,161. She was just given a 12-month conditional discharge and ordered to pay £40 legal costs. She is also required to pay back the overpayment in full!

An Ironville woman found guilty of fraud after claiming almost £7,000 in benefits she was not entitled to has made the subject of a curfew order. She has been given a six-month community order and will have to stay at home between 7pm and 7am. Wow. That'll teach her.

A York woman escaped a jail term when she was caught defrauding the taxpayer for the fourth time. She illegally claimed benefits of £8,368. She was given a community order with 12 months’ supervision and 50 hours’ unpaid work, and was ordered to pay £75 prosecution costs.

A Kingswinford woman who falsely claimed £30,000 of housing and council tax benefits and income support has escaped a jail sentence. Caught by data matching, she was given a nine-month prison sentence, suspended for 12 months, ordered to carry out 50 hours of unpaid work in the community and was electronically tagged for three months.

A repeat offender pedophile is on incapacity benefit. Why, one wonders. He seems to be well enough to assault 13 year old girls but not well enough to work.

A Crawley benefits cheat who conned taxpayers out of more than £65,000 has been jailed, for 12 months. He failed to declare that he had married in 1999 and that his wife worked full-time.

Finally, a Croydon benefit fraudster who falsely claimed more than £100,000 by pretending he was wheelchair bound "could face jail" after being caught on camera lifting furniture and doing DIY. He's due to be sentenced next month.

Osborne naive on Treasury role

We should welcome George Osborne 's commitment to openness in government spending but some of his comments show frankly astonishing naivete.

No longer will the Treasury be one of the largest spending departments, administering tax credits and child benefit, and with a budget larger than the Home Office.

It is not often you hear a would-be chancellor already planning to strip his department of responsibilities.

But ask yourself this: if the chaotic and hugely wasteful administration of tax credits had been the responsibility of another department like work and pensions, do you think the Treasury would have let them get away with it?"

Wake up, George! The DWP admits to £800m of fraud in the benefits system. As we've repeatedly shown, the true figure is well over £1bn and closer to £2bn.

Does the Treasury castigate the DWP? Not publicly. The main requirement seems to be for the DWP to contain the political fall-out - which sadly it seems to do quite effectively.

By the way, is George implying that he wants the DWP to run HMRC, as tax credits are part of the tax system? Or is this a casual proposal to change the way tax credits are administered?

The more you look at this proposal the more half baked it looks.

Of course if you raise tax thresholds and abolish tax credits, this particular problem is dissolved.

More benefit cheats

Maxine Carman from near Kings Lynn, who falsely claimed over £32,000 in benefits by pretending to be a single mother when she was in fact living with her partner, has been jailed for six months.

Peter Torr, a Derby County steward who falsely claimed more than £33,000 in benefits without his wife's knowledge, has also been jailed for six months.

They should also be hit in the pocket.

And what was high speed motorcyclist Peter Jackson from Knottingley doing claiming incapacity benefit?

Housing benefit fraud and benefit fraud totals

The Daily Mail has summarised some recent activity in the benefits fraud field. You can access the article through the Taxpayers' Alliance.

The theme is that "Lie detector tests trap fraudsters claiming hundreds of thousands in housing benefit".

Thousands of benefits cheats are being snared by lie detector systems which analyse stress levels in people's voices over the phone.

More than a third of claimants in some areas are being exposed as making fraudulent claims after being threatened with, or tested by, the technology.

A small number of councils that have been using Voice Risk Analysis (VRA) to root out bogus claims are estimated to have saved millions since 2007 alone.

They were joined last month by 25 more local authorities under a government scheme to tackle housing benefit fraud.

Harrow Council in London has contacted around 2,100 people since May 2007 and reduced housing or council tax benefits for more than a third.

In its national totals for benefit fraud, the DWP assumes that housing benefit fraud is £190m. That's a mere 1.2% of housing benefit paid out!

(The paper also reports that Basildon Council saved £235,000 in three months after reviewing 2,883 council tax benefit cases and finding more than one in five claimants was lying about living alone to receive a 25% reduction. But this is more likely to arise from comparing databases on the lines of the National Fraud Initiative than from voice risk analysis.)

The Mail says taxpayers lost £400 million to cheats in 2007. This is down from the figure of £440m it reported last month! But even the government admits to £800m. As this blog has shown, the true figure easily surpasses £1bn. Swansea council suggest it may be as high as £2bn.

I've blogged before that the DWP numbers for incapacity benefit fraud and single person discount fraud are way too low.

The housing benefit fraud discovered through the computer voice analysis runs at up to one third of claimants - way above the DWP's 1.2% rate.

If we up the rate for housing benefit fraud from 1.2% to a still pretty cautious 12%, that increases the fraud from £190m to £1900m! So what price the government's so called benefit fraud total of £800m now?!

Yet the Mail reminds us that the number of convictions was just 6,756 in 2007, down 2,000 from 2005. Of those, a third were let off with a discharge or suspended sentence and only 613 were jailed. The DWP only prosecute 60 cases per thousand benefit fraud cases, and this blog constantly reports examples of light sentences for benefit fraud.

Benefit fraud enforcement is a dignified part of the constitution - it is there for the sake of appearance but cannot work in any meaningful way because the process is too cumbersome to accommodate the huge numbers of prosecutions which serious enforcement would involve.

How can penalties deter when the risk of punishment is so small? There needs to be a clear, simple tariff which people can understand.

We are not talking here about innocent people getting understandably enmeshed in regulations which are too complicated for any ordinary mortal to understand. We are talking about deliberately defrauding the system.

Give a three month amnesty. During that period people could confess under the present arrangements.

Then new arrangements could be introduced. Under administrative penalties you will have to repay twice the amount - and will not be eligible for further benefits or tax credits until you have. If you are prosecuted, the same tariff will apply. But in addition, you will have to do unpaid work if you don't receive immediate imprisonment.

Government slightly toughens benefit fraud stance

People who commit a single act of fraud face having their housing benefit "slashed" as part of a tough new regime, reports Inside Housing (htp: Dave). "Slashed" is their word and is hardly appropriate, as we shall see.

The new ‘one-strike’ system, planned by the government, would cut benefit or remove it entirely after a first fraud offence. And why should fraudsters keep getting benefits?

The change would replace the current ‘two-strikes’ policy - and for the first time would also see punishment handed out in cases that did not result in a criminal conviction. Many cases are dealt with by administrative penalty - the courts simply could not handle even the small proportion of cases the DWP detects.

Under the new system people who had received an administrative penalty or formal caution for fraud would also be penalised, for periods of up to four weeks. In other words, a trivial toughening.

The detailed plans emerged in an analysis of the implications of the government’s new Welfare Reform Bill, published last week. The bill’s second reading in the House of Commons is planned for 27 January.

In its assessment the government states that the current system only affects a small number of offenders. But the one strike system would affect many more people. The government assessment states that ‘about 50,000 people per year are convicted for the first time or receive an administrative penalty or formal caution’.

If it goes ahead, the move could save the government £10 million a year because it will no longer be paying benefits to people convicted of benefit fraud, as was sometimes the case under the two-strike system.

Critics warned that the move could lead to increased debt and homelessness.

Judy Wayne, a housing practice director, at consultancy Tribal, said: ‘Housing benefit is there because people have a problem paying their rent. If people misuse the system that’s a criminal matter - and should be dealt with [through] that mechanism.’

Sam Lister, policy officer at the Chartered Institute of Housing, said he was concerned that people could be punished if they had breached the rules by mistake.

As usual, the "critics" don't consider the body of taxpayers. The welfare sector tends to attract specialists who are inclined to side with the claimant. Most cases of fraud don't get detected or sanctioned. I'm sure Judy Lister knows that the enforcement apparatus would seize up if all the detected cases were prosecuted. So it's a safe defensive position.

What's needed are clear, uniform meaningful penalties for benefit fraud that will be a real deterrent.

These dinky proposals are a tiny step in that direction. To that extent they're to be welcomed. From a political point of view a series of small steps is more likely to be accepted than one big step.

So let's welcome what should be the start of a process towards meaningful toughening.

Small sentence for benefit fraud

Stephen Leyland, from St Helens, has pleaded guilty to wrongly claiming housing, council and incapacity benefit.

He failed to declare two periods of employment, which resulted in an overpayment of £3,324.

He was sentenced to a 28 day curfew order for each offence to run concurrently, and ordered to pay £40 legal costs. He is also required to pay back the overpayment in full.

A pretty minimal punishment bearing in mind that mere administrative sanction would have brought a 30% penalty on the amount over-claimed.

£25,000 benefit fraud but probably no jail

Najabat Ali from High Wycombe has admitted fraudulently claiming nearly £25,000 in benefits over a period of six years. He was due to stand trial for claiming income support and council tax benefits he was not entitled to, but he pleaded guilty on what would have been the opening day of his trial.

Mr Ali, was granted bail until February 16, when he is expected back at the court for sentencing. The judge refused to rule out the possibility of a jail term, but said it was “unlikely”.

Benefit fraudsters jailed

A benefit cheat systematically stole £60,000 in payments, claiming he was too frail even to lift a kettle. But 44-year-old Joseph Olroy, from Paignton, who was jailed for two and a half years, had been leading a double life — working as a lifeguard on a South Devon beach.

James Marr from Workington, who fraudulently claimed around £16,000 in benefits, has been given an eight month suspended prison sentence. He failed to declare funds which would have disqualified him from claiming.

Maria Woodley from Bishop Auckland, who received £42,900 in benefits after failing to declare she was living with her partner, has been jailed for a year.

Kash Santos from Worcester Park, who carried out an elaborate £11,000 mortgage and housing benefit fraud, has been jailed for 12 months.

"Sponger" gets off lightly

John Gornall, from Bradford, pleaded guilty to two offences of failing to notify the DWP of a change of circumstances. His original claim for Incapacity Benefit and Housing and Council Tax Benefit was genuine, but he claimed £11,000 dishonestly after starting a job.

Judge Peter Benson told Gornall: “This was a deliberate piece of sponging on the state and you should be ashamed of yourself.” Mr Gornall was sentenced to a 12 month community order with 140 hours unpaid work.

That's a rate of £78 an hour with no financial penalty.

2 years jail for £140k benefit fraud

A scheming academic who used her brains to plot a £1.5 million benefit fraud has been jailed for two years.

Mojirola Daniels, from Kenton, managed to pocket £140,000 over eight years before she was nabbed by fraudbusters.

She claimed she had been forced to give the money to her former partner, who is also the father of her children, because he masterminded the fraud. But she claimed she did not know his name! - and was unsure of where he lived, saying he might be in the UK, USA or Nigeria.

Ms Daniels had drawn up a five-year business plan which aimed to bag £1.5m in illegal benefits.

It was professional. She had passports, blank driving licences, bank books, credit cards and a bagful of door keys. Some of her fake banking documents were so good that bank staff were duped.

She also had four computers and a laptop which held details of the falsely created documents used to make benefit claims and open bank accounts.

The scheme only failed after an alert member of the public noticed benefit post delivered to someone who did not live at the address. Brent Council Audit and Investigation Team were alerted and they launched undercover surveillance.

Ms Daniels was seen using illegally obtained keys to enter the property, take benefit cheques and deposit them in various bank accounts.

She was followed to an ATM machine where she withdrew cash from one of the bank accounts used to perpetrate the fraud.

Jailing her for two years, Judge Grobel said: "This was a carefully organised fraud on a substantial and prolonged scale (that she had) adopted and readily embraced, and which due to the amount and method required a deterrent element in the form of a prison sentence."

Council chiefs have managed to claw back £4,000 but face a battle to obtain any more of Daniel's ill-gotten gains because she has no assets.

Well, none that they have found.

The sentence is too light. Benefit thieves should not be entitled to any more benefit until they have paid back twice the defrauded amount.

Piffling punishment for £10,000 fraud

A woman who fraudulently received nearly £10,000 in housing benefit from Barnet Council has been given an unpaid one hundred hours work community punishment order and told to pay £500 costs.

Eunice Opare had left her address in Barnet but continued to receive housing benefit payments into her bank account for 10 months, creating an overpayment of £9,695.

In her interview by Barnet Council's Anti Fraud Team she admitted she knew she was receiving money she wasn't entitled to from 5 July 2007 to 18 May 2008 and had expected the investigation to happen one day.

Bnefit cheat jailed

An Ellesmere Port mother has been jailed for 12 months after pleading guilty to fraudulently claiming nearly £60,000 of benefits.

Dawn Hannigan claimed that she was a single, unemployed mother paying rent to a private landlord.

In fact, the 38-year-old mother of one worked as a hairdresser and her so-called landlord was her partner who was also in employment.

She had been claiming income support and housing benefit since 1999 until an investigation initiated by the DWP found her out.

Benefit cheat actually jailed

Michael McQueen from Penwarne Farm, Mawnan Smith, who swindled more than £51,000 from the DWP, has been jailed for 18 months.

Mr McQueen was receiving disability living allowance, incapacity benefit, income support, housing benefit and council tax relief while working full time in six different jobs over a six-year period. His deception was discovered when local authority records were checked following a claim for housing benefit

Fraudster's victory over crime profits

FITNESS instructor who carried out a £14,000 benefits scam and made two fraudulent mortgage applications has won a legal battle against the taxman.

HRMC wanted Rebecca Halliday to pay almost £1.2 million alleged to be the proceeds of her 'criminal lifestyle'. But Recorder Stephen Thomas ordered 43-year-old mother-of-one Halliday to pay £53,749 or go to prison for 18 months.

Mrs Halliday, who lives with her husband at a £700,000 four-bedroom converted church in Newchurch, last year admitted five charges of fraudulently obtaining tax credits while living with the man she later married.

HMRC then carried out an investigation and decided she had also made two fraudulent mortgage applications with inflated income figures.

Recorder Thomas ruled that she had recoverable assets of £53,749 made up of her share of £21,039 in the marital home, £25,714 in a property in France, a £6,800 Land Rover and £150 in the bank.

He ruled that the level of benefit she acquired through criminal conduct amounted to £473,269 - but the court was only able to seize £53,749.

"This defendant had a criminal lifestyle and there has not been any argument about that," said the judge.

"There were two occasions which amounted to giving false information on mortgage applications. Without the proper information on income, no proper decision could be made.

"It must have been known to Rebecca Halliday because giving false information begs the question - if it had not been significant, why not give truthful figures?

"There must have been a fear that if proper information had been given, that mortgage would not have been granted, and that amounted to criminal conduct. Can a criminal lifestyle be legitimately applied? Yes.

"In respect of the tax credits and a remortgage advance in June, 2006. I cannot accept the defence submission that there has been an abuse of process which has been oppressive."

Recorder Thomas said that between April, 2003, and February, 2006, Halliday applied for tax credits as a single person.

"She was not a single applicant and compounded the deception by ringing the tax credit hotline in July, 2006, knowing that her circumstances would change due to getting married, but she continued to receive money which she used to pay for general living expenses," he said.

"But she had moved into The Sanctuary with another person and was living there as a married couple. Because of this deception, she was arrested and charged and later pleaded guilty before Burton magistrates to five charges of fraud between April, 2003, and February, 2006. She admitted failing to disclose that she was living with a person and they were married."

She was jailed for eight months, suspended for two years, and ordered to carry out 200 hours of community service.

htp: Dave

Tories scorn incapacity benefit "reforms"

Labour's latest crackdown on Britain's sicknote culture has been denounced as a sham. The Tories said the details of flagship plans to get millions off incapacity benefit reveal that few strings will be attached to handouts for those found to be fit enough to work.

Claimants over the age of 50 will be asked to attend just one 'work focused interview' to continue receiving their benefits. Almost half of the 2.6 million people claiming incapacity benefit are over 50.

Those under 50 will have to turn up to three interviews. Any further participation in back-to-work programmes will be voluntary, the DWP admitted.

Research commissioned by the Government suggests almost two-thirds of long-term incapacity claimants are in fact fit for employment. It plans to re-test all claimants and move them on to a new employment and support allowance.

But Tory work and pensions spokesman Chris Grayling said the revelation that so few conditions will be applied was ' startling and disappointing'.

'It's hugely disappointing to see that Labour's tough talk about welfare reform masks a hidden plan to do very little to tackle our biggest benefit challenge - the millions of people stranded on incapacity benefit,' he said.

'Once again this Government has been caught talking tough but doing very little behind the scenes.'

The 2.6 million incapacity benefit claimants are equal to 7% of the working age population - up from 720,000 in 1979. In some areas, one in four of working age is now on incapacity benefit.

The proportion citing mental illness, such as stress or depression, has risen to 40%, compared to less than a quarter in 1997.

Source

Dudley warns single person discount cheats

Dudley currently has 42,000 council taxpayers who claim to live alone and receive a 25% discount off their council tax bill.

The council are now offering claimants an amnesty if they tell them before 28 February that they wish to withdraw their claim. They will still have to pay any back taxes due.

If data matching identifies an incorrect claim after then, the council is warning that as well as reclaiming the overpaid discount, it can impose a fine or prosecute fraudsters for theft in the magistrates court.

Coventy's benefit fraud backlog

A slightly confusing report says Coventry City Council is trying to recover £6million of benefit overpayments covering the last ten years.

The council’s deputy leader, Conservative councillor Kevin Foster, said £2.5 million of the £6 million overpayment was being recovered through the maximum amount the council was allowed to deduct from people’s benefits.

Action taken against fraudsters ranged from a caution equal to a police caution, to a fine equal to 30% of overpayment, through to prosecution.

Benefit fraudster was council employee

Gali Shapira, a former Bristol City Council worker, has been jailed for raking in almost £80,000 in illegal benefits during a "determined" spree of dishonesty dating back to 1997.

The defence concentrated on her drug addiction and "chaotic lifestyle". But as the judge said, "this was determined, committed and fraudulent criminality".

She was jailed for a year but there was no order for costs even though the City Council's investigation cost some £7,500.

Benefit fraud prosecutions down

In discussing benefit fraud prosecution, the Daily Mail uses a way too low figure of £440m for total benefit fraud. Even Mr McNulty admits to £800m - and as we've seen the true number is more likely to be around £2bn.

This makes the numbers for prosecutions even more shocking.

• Since 2005, convictions have fallen by more than 2,000 to 6,756 in 2007.
  
  
• Of those, around a third - some 2,262 - were effectively let off with a discharge or suspended sentence and only 613 bogus claimants were jailed.

The Department for Work and Pensions spent £154million tackling benefit fraud, including £8million on the high profile 'No Ifs, No Buts' campaign. But only £106million was identified in dodgy claims, and just £22million was actually recovered for the taxpayer.

The total number of convictions and cautions for benefit fraud has stayed roughly the same in the three years to 2007 - around 19,000.

However in 2005, cautions accounted for 10,053 cases and convictions in court totalled 8,947. By last year, the number of cautions had risen to 12,022 and convictions dropped to 6,756.

The court system will always be a blockage to high volumes of prosecutions.

Therefore sentences must be set to deter people from offending in the first place.

People convicted of benefit fraud who don't receive a custodial sentence should have to do unpaid work. Benefit fraudsters should also have to repay twice the amount and should not be eligible for further benefits – including tax credits - until they have.