After BHS filing for administration yesterday all eyes are now on Sir Phillip Green, the chain’s previous owner, to understand just how the company’s pension scheme ran into a £571 million deficit.
Green sold the chain to a consortium of backers and lawyers named Retail Acquisitions for £1 in 2015, after buying it for £200 million in 2000. Whilst Green has offered to voluntarily contribute £80 million to the pension plan deficit, it is likely that he will be asked for more when questioning begins by a House of Commons committee.
John Mann, the Labour MP and member of the Treasury select committee, called on Green today to repay £400 million of dividends that were paid out of BHS, or face giving up his knighthood.
Mann said: “Sir Philip Green and his family have made millions out of BHS and its hardworking staff. He took over a company with a healthy pension pot, yet when he sold BHS a black hole had appeared in its fund.
Green was not the only owner to make money from the chain and leave it high and dry, with Retail Acquisitions directors paying themselves £8.4 million in ‘professional fees’ just after acquiring it.
As it currently stands, the deficit means members of the pension scheme who are yet to retire will be paid a less generous pension – which is likely to be investigated in the coming months by a Commons committee.
26/04/2016
