Highland Council's staff developed the anti-fraud scheme

An e-learning system developed by Highland Council to raise awareness among staff of benefit fraud has been hailed as a major success.

More than 250 councils are now about to introduce the scheme to combat fraudulent claims of housing benefit and council tax benefit.

All 110 front-line staff across the Highlands have completed the course.

Allan Gunn, the council's client and control manager with finance services, said: "As the Highland Council covers a geographical area larger than Wales, the challenge was for us to create an effective alternative to classroom fraud awareness training for our staff.

"We found that e-learning was the answer and the result we have is a high quality product that has been very well received both in Highland and the UK."

As well as covering all topics relating to fraud, the product also allows for some personalisation to reflect local priorities.