A benefits cheat, who was caught jiving at dance classes while claiming it took him up to four minutes to walk ten yards with the aid of two walking sticks, may lose his home to pay for his ill-gotten gains.

Leonard Priestley, 58, was also filmed carrying large items and jumping over a wall by a Department of Work and Pensions surveillance team.

Priestley, of Rayleigh Street, East Bowling, Bradford, pleaded guilty last March to dishonestly pocketing £14,025 of disability living allowance over four years. He was sentenced to a 12-month community order with supervision.

Yesterday Priestley was back in the dock at Bradford Crown Court for a Proceeds of Crime hearing.

Prosecutor Robert Stephenson said the proceeds of crime was agreed between the parties.

Mr Stephenson said the total criminal benefit was £15,605 and the available amount was £11,000.

Judge Jonathan Durham Hall QC gave Priestley six months to pay, with eight months imprisonment in default.

The court heard Priestley had already paid £910. It is understood he will have to sell his home to meet the debt, as he has no other assets.

Judge Durham Hall told him: “You must pay the money or the authorities will be after you, you will go to prison for eight months and the debt won’t be wiped out.”

Priestley’s original claim for the benefit had been genuine but his condition greatly improved.

As well as having very limited mobility, he had also said he needed help washing, dressing and cooking meals when he first made the claim.

But benefit investigators discovered that he had attended dance classes, lasting an hour and a half and with jives, kicks and turns, once a week for four years.

The benefit fraud team had put Priestley under surveillance between March and September 2011.

He was filmed walking round carrying large objects and jumping over a wall.

Priestley told investigators his condition had improved.

He could walk for a bit longer and “did a bit of dancing now and then”.

The fraudulent claim spanned a period from November 2007 to November 2011.