A MOTHER who used fraudulently-claimed benefits to provide a bed for her young son has been ordered to repay more than £1,700.

Appearing before Selby Magistrates’ Court, Joanne Lamb pleaded guilty to committing benefit fraud, by failing to inform Selby District Council she was no longer living at her Nalton Street home.

Lamb, 25, moved to a new address in Gatesby Road, Goole, but continued to claim housing benefit for more than three months.

The court heard Lamb was interviewed under caution in March and said she understood that she had not told the authority of her change of residence.

She also told the council she had not spent the money straight away, and intended to give it back to the council, but her son did not have a bed at her new home, and it was getting close to Christmas, so she spent it on him and other goods.

Lamb wept as she told the court: “All I can say is I’m truly sorry, and I didn’t know what I was doing. I spent the money when I shouldn’t have done.”

She was given a 12-month community order and 45 hours’ unpaid work, and was told to repay in full the £1,785 housing benefit overpayment.