Mum on benefits should have declared bingo win
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A MOTHER of five who won £75,000 at bingo ran out of luck when she failed to declare her windfall to the benefits agencies.
Josephine McGlade, 55, scooped the jackpot playing an online version of the game.
But McGlade was claiming benefits due to ill health, so was obliged to inform the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), as well as her local council.
McGlade, of Sheepridge, West Yorks, said she kept the win secret as she had given most of the money to her family.
But she pleaded guilty to two charges of dishonestly failing to notify a change of circumstances likely to affect her entitlement to a benefit, between November 2015 and May 2016.
McGlade, who suffers from severe arthritis, claimed housing benefit, as well as employment and support allowance.
She received these benefits on the basis that she was unable to work due to ill health and had no income or capital.
Jill Seddon, prosecuting, told Kirklees magistrates’ court: “The money was paid into her account and she was aware that she must let the DWP know about any change of her circumstances. Information then came to light that she won £74,989 from an online gambling site... in October 2015 [which was] paid into her Royal Bank of Scotland account.
“She did not declare that she’d won a very substantial amount of money, but said she gave most of it away and didn’t think of it as hers any more.”
McGlade received benefits totalling £5,700 as a result of the fraud, magistrates heard.
Mike Sisson-Pell, mitigating, said that “being the type of woman she is” McGlade immediately decided to give the bingo winnings to her loved ones.
She gave her son money to buy his £60,000 council house because she believed that she would just “fritter it away”.
She then gave £2,000 to each of her four other children and bought her daughter a new car.
Mr Sisson-Pell said: “She didn’t keep a single penny for herself, but in doing what she did she fell foul of the law.
“The local authority found out because on the application form for [her son’s] house there was a question about where the money came from and she put that she had had a win.
“It’s nice when people like her have a bit of luck and unfortunate that this bit of luck has brought her before the court for dishonesty.”
McGlade, who has since paid back the money to the benefits agencies, was fined £80 and ordered to pay £85 costs. for jewellery enquiries/existing jewellery orders