Council to write-off fraudster's debt of more than £50k (From Thurrock Gazette)
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Council to write-off fraudster's debt of more than £50k
10:48am Tuesday 18th September 2012 in News
THURROCK Council has agreed to write-off a debt of nearly £54,000 owed by a fraudster.
The debt owed was racked up by someone fraudulently claiming housing benefit between April 2003 to April 2009.
Despite “intensive investigation” and various court and committal orders at Basildon Crown Court, the council claims it has “not been possible to trace the debtor”.
According to the Council’s Constitution, the write-off of any debt over £25,000 must be considered by the Council’s Director of Finance and Corporate Governance and the Monitoring Officer before it
is approved by the Cabinet.
The exact value of the debt is £53,731.61 and will be paid for out of the council’s general fund.
Speaking at the cabinet meeting, Cllr Phil Smith, the portfolio holder for Central Services warned that the crook will be dealt with if caught. He said: “What we would like to assure residents is that although we are going to take this debt off the books, the debt will stay there.
“If that person is found to come back into our area we will pursue them.
“We’ve gone after them twice in the courts and we’ve won both court cases so it’s just a matter of if we catch them, we will get that money back off of them.”
Comments(13)
C.E.R.
says...
12:57pm Tue 18 Sep 12
I would like to know why the debtor wasn't pursued earlier to stop the debt rising.
I agree with Thurrockbob!!
Bernard 87
says...
2:52pm Tue 18 Sep 12
This makes no sense. You either write off the debt and close the case altogether or you leave the debt outstanding in the hope of catching the fraudster.
"we will get that money back off of them.”
This is more hot air from this councillor. They will not get the money back. As far as I'm concerned all this benefit fraud is what happens when you have a system of dishing out money, which is supposed to be in place as a safety net, to anyone who applies without proper checks.
I don't know if this person is from Nigeria or anywhere else in the world for that matter so I'm not going to assume so
Freddy K
says...
3:33pm Tue 18 Sep 12
Why was the debt allowed to escalate to such a sum over a 6 year period, how intensive were the investigations, when was the first court order made and was the person still allowed to claim after this was served?
There are more questions than answers regarding this subject
jb411
says...
4:27pm Tue 18 Sep 12
Dave_
says...
5:24pm Tue 18 Sep 12
1 policing the handouts; who gets them, why etc
2 pursuing it before it got to these proportions
Again I can’t say where this individual is from, but when it comes to some services you have to have a qualifying connection to the borough and or lived there for more than 6 months. This should apply doubly to benefits.
Also the fact that there is council tax outstanding, when they are proposing a rise, is nothing short of moronic. There are people who can’t/won’t pay now, so all you end up doing is making the situation worse, amazing piece of logic there. I find it amazing that the finances of the council are treated in such a slap dash mannner. I would put all directors, heads and senior management in the council on a third of their salary and suspend all bonuses and other niceties and suspend all cllr pay and allowances, until the situation is resolved.
claysman
says...
10:37pm Tue 18 Sep 12
Kezza25
says...
11:52pm Tue 18 Sep 12
SaveOurStanford
says...
9:01am Wed 19 Sep 12
Imagine someone out there is cruising in style whilst we have to sit os southend for break seems unfair. TBC Staff can pay this back.
DannyButcher
says...
12:01pm Wed 19 Sep 12
If someone wants to commit fraud, and lies about things, how the hell do you think staff should be held directly responsible? Pretty ridiculous as far as suggestions go, so I'll take your last post as some sort of misguided joke.
Marcus P
says...
12:05pm Wed 19 Sep 12
All foreign nationals should have a five year qualifying period before welfare subsidies like Housing benefit can be claimed.
If this common sense ruling was introduced fraud of this type would diminish substantially.
Too much ‘English money’ is given away to people who made no contribution to this country.
Bernard 87
says...
1:39pm Wed 19 Sep 12
More of this will occur in the future while the council will struggle to find the culprits however you can bet your bottom dollar that people like Kezza will feel the full force of the council when they fall into difficulty and inform the council straight away.
However since the article doesn't state the origins of the culprits I will not assume that they are immigrants especially considering the story in the Gazette only a month or so ago about the English couple from Bulphan.
Farmhouse France
says...
4:21pm Wed 19 Sep 12
Marcus P wrote:I have to agree with you Marcus P. I'm not sure that anywhere else in Europe or the world for that matter hands out tax payers money so willy nilly.
Whilst we don't know the ethnic origin of the 'fraudster', it is safe to say they will most likely be a foreign national as they have 'disappeared'. All foreign nationals should have a five year qualifying period before welfare subsidies like Housing benefit can be claimed. If this common sense ruling was introduced fraud of this type would diminish substantially. Too much ‘English money’ is given away to people who made no contribution to this country.
Friends of mine got into trouble in France and before they were given any help they had to attend a college and learn to speak fluent French. We need tougher rules in place.
Thurrockbob says...
11:07am Tue 18 Sep 12