"Benefits cheats to lose driving licences"

[styles]

Doesn't seem wise to take away somebody's (likely) primary mode of transport which allows them to get to work, if you actually want people to get to back to work.

 

[Gostav]

I would name & shame. Make offenders do public work in view of the public. Make them visible so everyone knows who they are. This should apply not only to benefit fraudsters but to anyone including the famous & wealthy. Poor & rich treated the same. Embarrassment is a good form of punishment.

This may work in good neighborhoods, but in poor & bad areas, people will have a hard time telling the difference between them and the countless other people in the area who have with a crime record. People would sigh and say, "This place is full of rapists, liars and thieves. You'll get used to it."

 

[ainsworth74]

I would name & shame. Make offenders do public work in view of the public. Make them visible so everyone knows who they are. This should apply not only to benefit fraudsters but to anyone including the famous & wealthy. Poor & rich treated the same. Embarrassment is a good form of punishment.

This would require us to start having court reporters again of course, which in my opinion would be no bad thing, as things like this are already public information. Just no-one bothers to report it...

 

[GusB]

The article quoted in the OP specifically says that,

Convicted benefits cheats who fail to pay back the taxpayer could be stripped of their driving licences, under government plans to crack down on fraud.

If someone is guilty of genuine benefit fraud, they should really be facing a prison sentence, rather than the threat of their driving licence being removed.

Having said that, the benefits system is complex and it's very easy to fall foul of the rules. I'm not sure that I trust the government and its agencies to properly differentiate between actual benefit fraud, a simple misunderstanding of the rules by claimants and payments that are incorrectly calculated by DWP (Department of Work and Pensions) staff.

It wasn't so long ago that there was an issue with claimants of Carers Allowance:

Government launches inquiry into Carer's Allowance payment scandal

Some carers had to pay back thousands of pounds to the government, pushing them into financial distress.

www.bbc.co.uk

Carers have said they were not aware they had been wrongly overpaid the benefit because many did not realise they had exceeded the earning limit for it - which is capped at £151 a week, or just over 13 hours work on the minimum wage.

The government gives an £81.90 allowance for people who care for someone for more than 35 hours a week. But anyone who earns even a few pence more than £151 a week from other work is required to repay all of their Carer's Allowance.

The DWP is utterly ruthless when it decides to reclaim overpayments. My mother was encouraged to put in a claim for Pension Credit and it was awarded. However, it failed to take into account the small Forces pension that she received, despite that income being declared from the outset. If my mum had been in debt to a bank or a credit card company, they'd have been obliged to take into account her ability to pay the debt back; not so with the DWP - it tried to claw back the money in as short a time as possible and there was no negotiation.

My mum didn't drive, but I'd be horrified if someone like her was deprived of their driving licence because of some bureaucratic blunder.

 

[IanXC]

This would require us to start having court reporters again of course, which in my opinion would be no bad thing, as things like this are already public information. Just no-one bothers to report it...

Thats a good point actually. Such reporting has died a death over the last few years.

Presumably courts release the data in a structured format, surely someone like Reach could create an automated tool to collect the data and use it to create vast amounts of coverage. I wonder if the fact they don't is a political statement. Hmm.

 

[takno]

Presumably courts release the data in a structured format, surely someone like Reach could create an automated tool to collect the data and use it to create vast amounts of coverage. I wonder if the fact they don't is a political statement. Hmm.

Why would the courts release the information in a structured format? Even if they did, turning that information into engaging non-libellous content which is guaranteed not to prejudice other trials isn't a trivial task.

 

[Ediswan]

Why would the courts release the information in a structured format? Even if they did, turning that information into engaging non-libellous content which is guaranteed not to prejudice other trials isn't a trivial task.

The local web news (Newsquest) does court reports. Formulaic, just the facts. I have obscured name etc below as I don't have a reason to make this one conviction easier to search for.

https://www.thecomet.net/news/24880031.latest-court-results-stevenage-surrounding-area/

<name>: <age>, of <address>. On July 27, 2024, drove a Volkswagen Touran on Broadhall Way, Stevenage while over the drink drive limit, <name> had 160 milligrams of alcohol in 100 millilitres of urine. Fined £350 plus ordered to pay court costs £85, victim services £140. Disqualified from driving for 3 months.

 

[rapmastaj]

How about taking the driving licenses off road rage maniacs and boy racers, not people whose misdemeanor has nothing to do with driving?

 

[najaB]

How about taking the driving licenses off road rage maniacs and boy racers, not people whose misdemeanor has nothing to do with driving?

I don't know if you're using misdemeanor in the legal sense, but this would be reserved for people who's offences rise to the level of being heard in Crown court rather than before the magistrates.

 

[1D54]

Seem to be following the USA to a degree who strip driving 'privaliges' from people who fall behind on alimony payments. Government seem to be coming up with daft ideas for the sake of it and seeing what public opinion is like. This one will die a death like many others from both Con and Lab

 

[Egg Centric]

The local web news (Newsquest) does court reports. Formulaic, just the facts. I have obscured name etc below as I don't have a reason to make this one conviction easier to search for.

https://www.thecomet.net/news/24880031.latest-court-results-stevenage-surrounding-area/

Those look like a small subset of what was going on in the courts on those dates though. I can't believe that someone speeding on Rickmansworth Road in Watford and getting a £100 fine would have taken up the entirety of a court's day.