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MEP is jailed for benefit fraud

by liamssoft | September 4, 2007 at 08:58 am | 337 views | add comment | 0 recommendations

Between February 1996 and September 2002 Mote fraudulently claimed thousands in income support and benefits from the Department for Work and Pensions. The unemployed business man failed to notify the benefits agency when he began earning money again in 1996. How is he going to represent the public in jail?

An MEP for South East England has been jailed for nine months for falsely claiming benefits of more than £65,000.

Former UKIP MEP Ashley Mote, 71, was sentenced at Portsmouth Crown Court after being found guilty of 21 offences following a four-week trial.

Mote will retain his seat in Europe because he would only have been disqualified if he had received a term of imprisonment of more than 12 months.

The father-of-two sat as an independent MEP after being thrown out of UKIP.