Amsterdam council is looking into whether benefit fraud fines handed out between 2013 and 2014 should be repaid.

The council is re-examining 467 decisions on fines at a cost of around €10,000. The total cost of the operation, including repayment or writing off fines, could reach €lm, the NRC reports.

The council says revisiting the fines is necessary because the Board of Appeals, the highest social administration court, said in November that changes to the fraud law in 2013 meant that the question of whether someone gave the wrong information accidentally or intentionally was ignored in most cases.

Acting ombudsman Frank van Dooren said last December that the majority of people fined did not consciously do anything wrong. ‘Citizens of good will feel they are being treated like criminals,’ he said.

Amsterdam council now wants to put the situation right but expects the government to pay the bill. ‘It would be to the government’s credit to pay for this,’ SP alderman Arjan Vliegenthart says in Monday’s NRC.

‘After all, the government is responsible for the fraud law,’ he says.

Several other councils, including Leeuwarden and Helmond, said earlier this year they are re-examining benefit fraud fines.