Woman in £65k disability fraud claim 'played badminton'

Stewart Halstead, managing director of PartsWorld in Cannock, was unaware that his personal assistant Linda Hoey had a long-term health problem and had never seen her use a walking stick in the 16 years they worked together.

Apart from a 12-week period in 2014 when she had colonoscopy surgery, he could not remember her taking a day off sick, he told Stafford Crown Court.

Mr Halstead said the office in Orbital Way was based on the first floor and employees would have to go downstairs to use the only toilets or make drinks in the kitchen. Hoey, 57, would make drinks for his visitors and took her turn making tea and coffee for the rest of the staff, he said.

There was no lift in the building and nor had there been at their previous base in Burntwood. As his office overlooked the entrance, he could also see her walking unassisted across the car park and said she would sometimes go to Sainsbury's quarter of a mile away to pick up store room items for the office.

"Her duties were computer screen based but she would take turns in making hot drinks, and there were no toilets on the first floor, so she she would be up and down the staircase 12 - 15 times a day," he said.

Asked by prosecution barrister Mr Andrew Cartin how she walked, Mr Halstead replied: "Perfectly normal."

He said she had never asked for any adaptations to accommodate her degenerative arthritis or back problem, or to be relocated.

In cross-examination, Ms Marion Smullen, defending, put it to Mr Halstead that her client had had 189 days off sick between 2004 and 2014 and had sometimes asked to start late or finish early in order to fit in physiotherapy and doctors' appointments.

Mr Halstead replied she 'wasn't the sort of person to be constantly off sick' and added that she sometimes worked through her lunch breaks so she could leave early but that was to go for a swim or to play badminton.

He did not recall her discussing her health problems with him, as Ms Smullen suggested.

Stafford Crown Court also heard evidence from Linda Noakes, an assistant at Kings Bromley Marina where Hoey and her husband moored a narrow boat.

Mrs Noakes said the Hoeys would come for a weekend about once a month and although Linda was usually with her husband Mick, she had seen her walk unassisted for around 200 metres.

Hoey, of Talland Avenue, Armington, Tamworth, denies fraudulently misrepresenting her claim to the DWP by exaggerating her mobility and care needs between 2001 and 2015 and misusing an exemption pass for the M6 Toll Road between 2004 and 2015.

The overpayments together totalled £65,244. The trial continues.