A WOMAN who allegedly claimed £83,000 of income support payments she was not entitled to by lying about living alone refused to give her partner’s address when asked by Customer and Local Services, the Royal Court heard yesterday.
Georgina Mason (39) is accused of failing to declare that her partner had moved in with her and continuing to receive income support by claiming she was single.
Ms Mason denies charges of failing to notify a change of circumstances to Social Security and receiving income support using false information between September 2018 and October 2021.
The court heard yesterday that Ms Mason argued in interviews with Customer and Local Services staff that she had broken up with her partner, and that he only came to her home to visit their daughter.
But Instagram and Facebook posts show them operating as a family unit, Crown Advocate Luke Sette, prosecuting, told the court.
Social media posts show the pair getting engaged on Christmas Day 2018, but Ms Mason claimed in an interview with a CLS enforcement officer that they were not in a relationship and she was not seriously planning on getting married.
Asked whether the ring she was wearing was an engagement ring, she claimed it “symbolises our child”.
Asked where her alleged partner lived, Ms Mason said in the interview that “it’s just none of your business where he lives” and refused to provide an address.
In communications with Ms Mason, CLS staff had said they were “struggling to place him anywhere but yours”.
Advocate James Bell, defending, said that new evidence, provided overnight after the trial opened on Monday, showed that CLS had heard of Ms Mason’s former partner’s couch-surfing and him using Ms Mason’s address to receive mail.
In an email chain between Ms Mason’s alleged partner and CLS, he told the service he was “in-between addresses” and later found a new address, the court heard.
Throughout this time, he was making regular visits to his daughter, who was living with Ms Mason and used her address as a “care-of” address to receive mail, Advocate Bell told the court.
Lieutenant Bailiff Jane Ronge and David Le Heuzé were sitting as Jurats. Deputy Bailiff Robert MacRae was presiding.
The trial continues.
