Benefits families could pay off £1m mortgage

 

Almost 100 families are raking in enough housing benefit to fund a £10 million mortgage, raising fresh doubts over the Government’s cap, figures released yesterday show. Some 30 families are receiving £1,500 a week — three times what they would be earning on a national average wage — to pay their rent while another 60 are receiving up to £5,000 a month, according to the Department for Work and Pensions. All the claimants, who would be able to fund a seven-figure mortgage at those rates, live in the London boroughs of Kensington and Chelsea or Westminster. One critic said the figures showed that it was an “unfair” system that punished hard-earning families who could not always afford to live where they wished. In total 130 families are given more than £1,000 a week,