A RURAL council has been praised for the way in which it handles benefit fraud.

An inspection report into the way Teesdale District Council administers housing benefit, council tax benefit and counter-fraud activity was published yesterday.

The report, from the Benefit Fraud Inspectorate, described the authority's work in many areas as being "generally good".

The report acknowledges the housing benefits service has been continuously improving since March 2003 and says: "Taking account of the unique challenges faced by Teesdale District Council as a small rural council, its efforts to improve claims processing times are commendable."

However, the council has not achieved standards in some areas because policies and procedures have not been fully documented.

The chairman of the administration and governance committee, Councillor David Armstrong, said: "We have made tremendous improvements in our benefits service over the last 18 months and these improvements are evidenced by the fact that we are now in the top 25 per cent of the country in three out of five performance indicators.

"We are not complacent in our recent achievements and we are now moving up a gear to respond to the challenges of meeting the standards."

A plan to ensure the council achieves the standards within 18 months is close to completion.