perfidy

In tomorrow's Telegraph, there's a story entitled "Benefits cheat's high-flying life paid for by 'secret' inheritance".

Standard fare, really. The story's protagonist, while hardly evil, is not among the most sympathetic of characters:

Malcolm Bingley, a former gentleman's outfitter who had not worked for 17 years, was later discovered to have £75,000 in a bank account.

He was among the last passengers of the Concorde, which was a fine, fine ride in its day, but there's a catch:

Bingley, 60, was convicted of 10 counts of benefit fraud by Sunderland magistrates, fined £500 with £300 costs and given 14 days to pay back £5,456 he received for two years' Jobseekers' Allowance while failing to declare his true financial position.

Neil Snaith, for the Department of Work and Pensions, said Bingley was caught when a computer found anomalies between interest on his bank accounts and the fact that he was on means-tested benefit.

Questioned about transactions from his account, one of which he explained was for airline tickets, Bingley told officials: "It was expensive because it was Concorde. I can bring a picture of it in, and a certificate with my name on."

OK, so that explains why it was so expensive, but not the lack of recognition of the ironic juxtaposition between 17 years of unemployment benefits and his extravagance. Turns out he thought, and claims to have had confirmation, that this was all just ducky.

He was less effusive, however, when asked why he had ticked "no" on a benefits claims form asking about savings and accounts. He did not declare his inheritance, after his mother and aunt died, because he "didn't think it was relevant".

He claimed that Jobcentre staff had told him he could carry on claiming.

Not relevant? Of course not.

But while in an absolute sense, the bilked money we're talking about here is truly small beer, the more I read, the more I waited for a punchline, the better to assuage my bulging eyes, bulging caused by the fact this guy clearly has the balls of a brass monkey. And at the end, I got my punchline. Without hint of irony (which is often lost in print media, so perhaps we was being ironic), he said:

"The court's decision is very harsh. I have to pay back the full amount. I think everyone should be entitled to a holiday."

If he wasn't just joshing, I'd contend we've found a role model for the Howard Dean's self-styled Democrat Wing of the Democrat Party.