Claimants forced to pay back thousands of pounds tell of ‘horrendous’ court ordeals and of desire for official apology
Claimants forced to pay back thousands of pounds tell of ‘horrendous’ court ordeals and of desire for official apology
Vivienne Groom had never been inside the dock of a criminal court when she stood, sobbing and shaking, before a judge last year.
She was accused by the government of unlawfully claiming nearly £17,000 in carer’s allowance while she juggled a minimum wage supermarket job with being the sole carer for her dying mother.
The quiet 61-year-old – with not even a parking ticket to her name – was horrified by the alleged infraction.
She was prosecuted under legislation usually reserved for major drug dealers and told by the Department for Work and Pensions she could be sent to prison.
“I was absolutely petrified. I was in such a mess. I wouldn’t have coped,” she said, adding that she would have killed herself had she been jailed. “I was suicidal. I would’ve done myself in.”
One judge saw that Groom, from Tarvin near Chester, was evidently not the typical benefits cheat, telling her “you were living an ordinary lifestyle, just doing your best”.
Another also showed compassion but, without legal representation and desperate to get the ordeal over, Groom pleaded guilty.
She was spared jail but ordered to hand the government the entire £16,000 inheritance left by her mother, Maud, when she died at the age of 91.
The shocking case is the first to be revealed by the Guardian as part of a carer’s allowance investigation that began in early 2024. Hundreds more carers have been prosecuted in a similar way and hundreds of thousands of people have been ordered to repay about £350m between them since 2019.
