Housing fraud is “an attack on people who haven’t got homes”, according to NI Conservatives’ spokesman, Mark Brotherston.
“We’ve been saying that there must be welfare reform in Northern Ireland and one of the main reasons is to get to grips with abuses of the system”, Mark explained. “The BBC Spotlight programme has exposed that there are huge problems with illegal sublets and so called ‘dole drop’ properties which are used to claim extra benefits. This is particularly insidious because many of these properties are empty, which means the 10,000 families in Northern Ireland who are waiting for a house remain homeless.”
“Benefits fraud is not a victimless crime. It takes money and resources out of the hands of people who need them, it takes cash out of the wallets of hard-working people and in this instance it means people are left without a home. The Northern Ireland Housing Executive needs to examine this issue very carefully and make sure it is doing everything in its power to solve the problem. Meanwhile the executive mustn’t continue to put off reforming the welfare system here. Its failure is set to cost £200 million per year that could be used to deliver other services and it’s preventing real efforts to get to grips with benefit fraud, which are beginning to pay dividends elsewhere in the UK.”