£43M IN BENEFITS GOES TO CHEATS WHO LIVE ABROAD

Secretary of State for Work and Pensions Iain Duncan Smith

Monday April 16,2012

By Martyn Brown

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MINISTERS will unleash a new blitz on benefit fraud today to stamp out cheats who claim state handouts while living abroad.

Scams that cost the taxpayer about £43million last year included claimants failing to report they had moved abroad.

Relatives also continued to claim benefits for people who had died.

Other fraudsters claimed cash while working overseas, exaggerated disabilities or failed to report assets, including savings, property or even yachts.

Overseas benefit fraud hotspots include Spain, Portugal and the US, but cases have also been traced to Thailand and Sweden.

Britons living overseas can still claim some benefits, including their state pension.

Sickness and disability allowances can also be claimed, depending on individual circumstances and whether your stay abroad is temporary or permanent.

But Disability Living Allowance, Pension Credit, Income Support, Jobseeker’s Allowance, Employment and Support Allowance cannot be claimed abroad.

The vast majority of British people overseas are law abiding

Secretary of State for Work and Pensions Iain Duncan Smith

The latest crackdown will see officials from the Department for Work and Pensions working more closely with the Foreign Office, bank staff and overseas fraud investigators. It is part of efforts to slash Britain’s multi-billion- pound welfare bill and help reduce the Government’s debt mountain.

Secretary of State for Work and Pensions Iain Duncan Smith said: “We are determined to clamp down on benefit fraud abroad, which cost the British taxpayer around £43million last year. This money should be going to the people who need it most and not lining the pockets of criminals sunning themselves overseas.

“The vast majority of British people overseas are law abiding, but fraudulently claiming benefits while living abroad is a crime and we are committed to stopping it.”

Emma Boon of the TaxPayers’ Alliance said: “The Government has to get tough on benefits cheats who scam the system and steal from taxpayers.

“It beggars belief that the system was in such a mess that people have managed to get away with claiming benefits for the dead.”

£42M BENEFIT BILL FOR CHILDREN WHO DON’T EVEN LIVE IN BRITAIN

Critics fear the bonanza could wreck David Cameron’s pledge to cut annual net immigration

Wednesday April 4,2012

By Macer Hall

BUMPER welfare handouts have made Britain an “extrem­ely attractive destination” for migrants from eastern Europe, a scathing report on the benefit system warned last night.

Research showed that foreign workers from within the EU can potentially pocket hundreds of pounds a week from a string of benefits as soon as they arrive in the UK.

Latest figures show around £42million a year in child benefit payments is handed out to migrant families whose children do not even live in Britain.

Critics fear the bonanza could wreck David Cameron’s pledge to cut annual net immigration from hundreds of thousands to tens of thousands.

The role that Britain’s benefits system – hugely generous by international standards – has on encouraging mass immigration was laid bare in a report from the population think-tank MigrationWatch.

Researchers pointed out that while newcomers are not immediately entitled to claim jobless benefits they can still pocket extra income from child, housing and council tax benefit as well as the tax credit system.With the sums paid out dwarfing average wages in Poland and other new EU nations, the welfare system was providing a huge incentive for migrants to target Britain.

The whole EU benefit regime must be renegotiated

Sir Andrew Green, chairman of MigrationWatch

The report showed that a single immigrant worker earning the minimum wage can expect up to £70 a week in benefits.

An immigrant family of four with both adults working can grab up to £360 a week, equal to £18,720 in a year.

Sir Andrew Green, chairman of MigrationWatch, said last night: “The whole EU benefit regime must be renegotiated.

“It is entirely understandable that east Europeans should want to improve their standard of living and make money which they can send home. It is also clear that many of them are valued for their strong work ethic.

“That said, it was a very serious mistake to extend full access to our benefit system to nationals of member states where the standard of living is only about one third of ours.

“This must be changed. We even pay child benefit at British rates to children who have never set foot in this country.”

Anne Main, Tory MP for St Albans, said: “If we expand benefits to people who have not paid into the system it is going to mean more and more tax for those who are paying in.

“I don’t blame people for seeking a better life for themselves and their families, but if this goes on it will have a negative impact on taxpayers.”

Around 750,000 arrivals from Poland, Lithuania and other former eastern bloc countries now in the EU could be followed by even more as these countries struggle with difficult economic conditions, the report said.

Restrictions on benefit claims for the countries that joined the EU in 2004 ended last year, giving hundreds of thousands of immigrants full access to Britain’s welfare state.

“The issue is that the much more generous UK benefit system to which they are now entitled might attract even larger numbers,” said the report.

“A Polish worker on minimum wage in Britain with a spouse and two children earns almost four times what he would get on the minimum wage at home, once the difference in cost of living has been accounted for.”

Analysis showed that the same worker who saved a fifth of his pay packet would be putting aside the equivalent of a week’s earnings back home.

A spokesman for the Department for Work and Pensions said: “We have a legal duty to provide support to people who come to this country. However, it is also necessary to protect the taxpayer and the benefit system from possible abuse.

“We need to make sure that the rules do not allow people to take inappropriate advantage of our benefit system.”

BARONESS ASHTON'S LOOK FOR £150K

Baroness Ashton

Monday April 2,2012

By Daily Express reporter

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SENIOR Eurocrat Baroness Ashton has hired a £150,000-a-year media adviser to try to improve her disastrous public image, it emerged last night.

The EU foreign affairs supremo is understood to have recruited Danish- born international relations expert Daniel Korski for the post.

But the move yesterday triggered fresh anger about the waste oftaxpayers’ cash by Brussels.

UK Independence Party Euro-MP Paul Nuttall said: “This is a disgrace. The EU already spends more than £8million a year on media relations.”

Former Labour peer Baroness Ashton has suffered widespread criticism since being appointed just over two years ago.

Many critics say the job – effectively the EU’s foreign secretary – is unnecessary and have questioned her competence.

To Mr Daniel Korski, I would say two words .... Mission Impossible

DAVID CAMERON 'UNWISE' OVER EU

David Cameron's handling of the eurozone crisis is expected to be condemned as “inconsistent"

Monday April 2,2012

By Macer Hall

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DAVID Cameron’s handling of the eurozone crisis is expected to be condemned as “inconsistent” and “profoundly unwise” in a report from MPs tomorrow.

In a verdict that confirms growing frustration among backbench Tories, the Commons European Scrutiny Committee will argue the Government lacks a strategy for protecting Britain’s interests in Europe.

It will also raise doubts about the Prime Minister’s motives in blocking a treaty for closer ties between eurozone countries. Earlier this year, Tory MPs cheered him for standing up to the EU over the new treaty plans at a Brussels summit.

But now many suspect the veto was meaningless and he is allowing French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel to create a “fiscal union” that will leave the UK isolated.

A draft of the report leaked yesterday said: “The Government has made clear that it has reservations about the legality of what has been done, but the question of what it intends to do remains unsatisfactorily unresolved.

Politically and legally, it is profoundly unwise to suggest taking action

Report

“Politically and legally, it is profoundly unwise to suggest taking action, and then not to explain how it intends to carry it through.”

Shock & Horror! looks like Mr Farage was right.