Northampton Borough Council has prosecuted a tenant who sublet a property to his son.
Patrick Hastings-Stroud has been served with a £250 fine and evicted from his home, after the arrangement was uncovered.
Mr Hastings-Stroud had moved into the address in 1983, but moved out and allowed his son and his girlfriend to live there, without updating the borough council of the situation.
Northampton Partnership Homes, which manages 12,000 council properties in the borough, first discovered that the defendant was not living in his allocated home when his son’s girlfriend submitted an individual application for social housing, following the end of their relationship.
Northampton Magistrates Court heard that the official tenant left the property in December 2013 to live with a friend.
Mr Hastings-Stroud pleaded guilty to breaching the terms of his tenancy and was fined £250 as a result. He was also ordered to pay court costs of £650 and a £25 victim surcharge.
He was evicted from the property due to the fact that he has no need for it.
Mike Kay, Northampton Partnership Homes’ chief executive, said: “The allocation process has been carefully drawn up to make sure that it fairly allocates accommodation to those most in need.
“That property should have, and will now be, allocated to someone in genuine need. We cannot tolerate queue jumping in any form – tenancy fraud is illegal and we will take action against people who are caught abusing the system.”