Opposition MPs were this week pushing ministers to adopt tougher laws on housing fraud, amid evidence that current regulations are too easily exploited.
Labour’s shadow local government team this week tabled amendments to the Localism Bill, due to be debated on 17 and 18 May, designed to tackle fraudsters who exploit the current system for housing allocations.
In two recent Court of Appeal cases, judges were unable to take back houses allocated on fraudulent grounds. In one case, in Birmingham, Labour’s team claimed, a corrupt housing officer assisted a healthy individual in securing a council home specially adapted for a disabled person.
Labour’s shadow housing minister, Alison Seabeck, said: ‘At the moment, the law allows people who defraud their way to a council house to keep it. That’s plainly wrong. The law needs to be on the side of people who stick to the rules, not those who wilfully break them.’
