A FORMER textile worker and bus driver who fraudulently claimed almost £47,000 in benefits has been jailed for six months.

Mohammed Bhatti, 63, pleaded guilty last month to two charges of dishonestly making a false statement to obtain income support and council tax benefit.

Jailing him at Bradford Crown Court today, Judge Robert Bartfield said he was passing sentence with a "heavy heart" yesterday, but said he had no option to "mark the seriousness" of the offence.

The court heard that Bhatti, of Roydstone Road, Thornbury, had failed to declare he owned a property, other than his own home, in Heath Terrace, Bradford Moor, for which he received rental income.

Prosecuting, Clare Benson said Bhatti had owned the house since 1981, but had not mentioned it when he first started to claim benefits in 2004.

She told the court that between April 2004 and November 2011, Bhatti had been paid £38,485 in income support which he was not entitled to as a result of his second property.

Between April 2004 and March 2013, he was said to have been overpaid £8,370 in council tax benefit, despite completing a form to review his claim in May 2012.

Miss Benson said Bhatti had made the claims on the basis he was unfit for work, signing forms to say he did not own any additional property or receive any rent.

"This was fraudulent from the outset, and carried out over a long period of time," she added.

Barrister Shufqat Khan, for Bhatti, told the court it was his client's children who dealt with ownership of the property, adding any rent received "was certainly not money making its way back to him."

He said Bhatti came to the UK and Bradford in 1965, working in the textile industry and then as a bus driver before retiring in 2003 due to ill-health.

"The money from the claim has not been spent on anything lavish or extravagant, it was used for everyday expenses," said Mr Khan, who also said Bhatti had already starting repaying the money at a rate of £64 per fortnight.

Sentencing Bhatti, Judge Barfield described him as a "hitherto honest and hard-working man", before adding: "You have claimed £47,000 of state money to which you are not entitled.

"When you filled in forms and said you didn't own any property, that was untrue, and you knew it was untrue.

"Everyone has to understand that if you commit deliberate fraud like this, the public would be rightly outraged at anything less than a prison sentence.

"You are a man in poor health, but in the end, these were massive amounts of public money you took.

"I pass this sentence with a heavy heart."