R v Winston [1999]

A tenant applied for housing benefit, including in his application a letter which purported to be from his landlord. The letter said that he was a tenant at the relevant address and paid a specified amount of rent per month. The tenant had actually written the letter himself, although the information contained within the letter was factual.The tenant was convicted of 3 offences of forgery. 
He appealed contending that although the letter was forged, other information that he had provided was correct. He said that the local authority had a duty to pay him housing benefit, and therefore they had not suffered any loss.

HELD: The Court of Appeal found that the construction of the Housing Benefit Regulations and the Social Security Administartiohn Act meant that an application would fail where forged documents were provided. Applicants are only entitled to housing benefit of they apply in the prescribed manner, and as the tenant had not then the local authority had no duty to pay it to him.

Citation: R v Winston [1999] 1 Cr. App. R. 337