Three women have been taken to court by Ealing Council after being paid thousands of pounds in benefits they were not entitled to.

Manjit Bains, 39, of Stanley Road, Southall, was sentenced to six-week prison sentence, suspended for a year by Ealing Magistrates.

She continued to be paid incapacity and council tax benefit by failing to disclose she had savings in the bank and was working at a restaurant in Southall.

Bains received £4,749 in benefits that she was not entitled to. Apart from the suspended prison sentence, she was given a community order requiring her to carry out 200 hours of unpaid work.

She was ordered to pay the council’s full costs of £568 and will also have to repay all the money she was overpaid.

In another case Sonia Kozlowska, 21, of Cambridge Road, Kilburn, claimed housing benefit for six months for an address in Acton she no longer lived at. She was overpaid £5,467 and was sentenced to a community order.

Claudette Whittingham, 58, of Cheltenham Place, Acton, was given a 20-week prison sentence, suspended for 12-months and given a supervision order. She was overpaid by £43,472 in housing and council tax benefits and income support.

Cabinet member for Finance and Performance, Councillor Yvonne Johnson, said: "Benefits are there to help those in genuine need and I find it appalling that people try to cheat the system."

"These women knew they were keeping information from us that they should have declared. What they did was wrong and they are all now paying the price for their dishonesty."