In the circumstances described, I'm not sure you will need to argue too much about whether the liability was contrived or not.
In my opinion, so long as the (previous) LA was given all info, any HB must by definition have been paid in error by the LA. Unless the clmt has relevant knowledge of the HB system, it should be next to impossible for the LA to argue that the clmt contributed to the O/P or that she could "reasonably have been expected to realise...." she was being overpaid. In turn, it won't matter if the liability was in fact contrived - the O/P will be non-recov in any case.
As an aside, are there Data Protection issues? On what grounds did the "new" LA contact the "old" LA? Was it reasonable in the circs?
Hope that helps.
Regards
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