Romanian capital of benefit fraud

Needless to say, until today, like many of you I had never heard of Tandarei. It may sound like something tasty from an Indian restaurant menu – but according to the Sunday Times hacks at least – this is a place that leaves a rather nasty taste in your mouth.

I have to say my eye was first caught by the pictures. It seems to be chock full of splendid villas of a slightly distasteful nature that are often sought out by Brits abroad on holiday. But then I started reading this story and got more and more amazed.

You see Tandarei appears to be a latter day Romanian gold rush town. Only some of the not-so-good people of Tandarei are not making a mint from prospecting for gold – they are stealing it from you and I as benefit fraud.

The scam seems rather clever – and obviously pays quite well. It appears to be based on local families shipping spare and surplus children over to Romanians already over here posing as self-employed. All the paperwork seems to be in order and benefits are duly paid into bank accounts.

Except that the bank accounts seem to belong to people with nice houses back in Tandarei – and a veritable fortune, millions and millions of pounds, is fizzing over the wires to Romania Apparently, things only go mildly wrong when too many people are shipped over to Stansted on the same plane – which makes customs and the police a tad suspicious. But other than that, things are obviously going rather swimmingly. If you want to go to Tandarei and hire a nice villa for your holidays – then you should feel right at home with hire car opportunities too. Apparently a common sight on the dusty unmade roads are right hand drive Range Rovers and other luxury 4x4s with British number plates.

I suspect most of them are not there entirely legally either. Mind you – Romanian crime bosses could steal every 4×4 in the UK and I think most of us would be entirely happy to see the back of them.

One day perhaps, organised crime will go green and start stealing Toyota Prius, But then again – maybe not!