You Must Think We're The Mugs...

A fraudster who conned the taxpayer out of £195,000 in Covid loans by making fake applications purportedly on behalf of legitimate businesses including High Street bakers Greggs has walked free from court with a suspended jail term.

What..?! How? 

Rais Kayani, 31...

*sighs* 

...'dishonestly benefited' from the scheme, pocketing the cash and transferring it to accounts overseas, Southwark Crown Court was told. On Monday, the keen amateur cricketer pleaded guilty to a single count of entering into a money laundering arrangement and received a 16-month term, suspended for 18 months.

I would say 'you couldn't make it up', but I'm getting sick of saying that. 

And this is yet another consequence of the Tory Government's failure to get a grip on the covid response.. They are coming in thick and fast now, and they show no signs of stopping. 

Speaking after the case, Ben Reid, of the Crown Prosecution Service, said: 'At a time of national emergency during the COVID-19 crisis, vast Government funds were released to support struggling businesses across the country.'

With little to no oversight and despite the warnings. A failure to be laid directly at the door of then-Chancellor Sunak. 

'We have already recovered £155,000 of taxpayer's money and will now seek a confiscation order for the remaining funds.'

What do you want, a cookie? It should never have been paid out in the first place... 

Speaking outside the Kayani family's £280,000 semi-detached home in Luton yesterday, Kayani's brother Anis, 34, said: 'He was a mug and he didn't make a penny out of it.'

Sure, sure, Anis, whatever you say... 

He implied that his brother was in a vulnerable state when he committed the offence saying it happened soon after their mother had died.

*yawns*