A DISABLED pensioner who spent his £100,000 life savings to bring his Thai bride to Bury faces jail over a disputed unpaid £272 council tax bill.

Seventy-year-old Arthur Franklin who married his wife Wan after a whirlwind six-week courtship, says he is prepared to go to prison rather than pay the money.

At Bury Magistrates on Wednesday (July 12), the retired electronics engineer was given a suspended 28-day jail sentence on the condition that he pays off the arrears at £5 a week.

Mr Franklin, of Pennine Close, Walshaw, whose wife is 32 years his junior, claims he was exempt from paying council tax because he had been receiving housing and other benefits.

Bury Council took the pensioner to court to recover the arrears which, because of costs, has now risen to £317.83p. The debts relate to the period between June, 1997, and September, 1998, when Mr Franklin lived in a local authority house in Furness Avenue, Whitefield.

Mr Franklin, who will be 71 on Monday (July 17), met and married Wan (38), while on holiday in Thailand in 1991.

Because the British immigration authorities claimed the wedding was a "marriage of convenience," Wan was refused a visa for the UK. The couple then travelled to Denmark where they rented a £600-a-month flat.

For the next seven years, the pensioner spent his life savings of £100,000 travelling between Bury and Copenhagen and meeting his new bride's living expenses. He then was in receipt of Income Support.

It was not until 1998 that the immigration authorities granted Wan the precious visa to allow her to live in England with her husband.

However, his Income Support was withdrawn weeks after the Bury man's successful immigration appeals tribunal heard he had £30,000 in his bank. He was subsequently arrested and interviewed over alleged fraud over Income Support payments before being released without charge.

Later, Bury Council suspended Mr Franklin's benefits which he had been receiving in respect of his Furness Avenue home between June, 1997, and September, 1998. They then sought to recover the outstanding council tax.

In court Mr Franklin, who was born with cerebal palsy and who walks with the aid of sticks, said he lived on £100 a week at the time of the appeal hearing.

Asked about the £30,000 in his bank, he said: "It was friends who loaned me the money. The tribunal wanted to see if I had enough money to support my wife. Later, I gave them back the cash."

He continued: "My full housing benefit was withdrawn in September, 1998. Now the council are saying I wasn't entitled to it and are trying to claim it back."

He told the magistrates: "My opinion is that I don't owe the money. This is driving me potty. I'm going crazy."

Mr Franklin went on: "I've never let anybody take money off me under false pretences and I'm not starting now."

But magistrates, after taking details of the Bury man's finances, told Mr Franklin he had sufficient savings to discharge the debt. They gave him a 28-day suspended prison sentence on condition he pays off the arrears at £5 a week.

After the court case, however, the pensioner remained defiant. "I've no intention of paying this," he said. "If they want to send me to prison, then so be it.

"It seems to me if you claim political asylum, they give you everything but if you're a pensioner, you get nothing."