One focused on a woman offering expats advice on how to fill out Attendance Allowance claims worth thousands in welfare payments. The scale of the deception was demonstrated when our undercover reporter managed to photograph the form Julie Potter had filled out on behalf of war photographer Peter Jordan. We found that it contained a string of falsehoods and exaggerations. Had it been submitted, the Department of Work and pensions would have been given the impression that Peter, who was due to climb a mountain the following week, was unable to wash or use the toilet independently, and could not be safely left alone for more than four hours. Julie said she had helped customers, who pledged to pay her the first four weeks of their benefits payments worth up to £5,000 a year, make hundreds of similar claims, potentially costing the taxpayer hundreds of thousands of pounds over the decade she has been operating.
Our reporting was published in the Sun on Sunday newspaper
The second focused on the tens of millions of pounds in UK disability benefits being spent overseas. For both articles we are grateful to the help and guidance provided by an unnamed whistleblower.
