PHILIP Green bought British Home Stores for £200m in 2000. He paid his wife a £1.2bn tax-free dividend in 2005 from BHS.

BHS performed poorly so Green sold it for just £1 in 2015 to Dominic Chappell’s Swiss Rock group.

In April 2016 BHS had debts of £1.3bn, including a pension deficit of £571m.

Despite the deficit of £571m, Green and his family collected £586m in dividends, rental payments and interest on loans during their 15-year ownership of the retailer 2000 – 2015.

When BHS went bust 11,000 people lost their jobs. In November 2020 Dominic Chappell the BHS purchaser was jailed for 6 years this year for tax evasion.

Sir Philip owned more than 2,000 shops in the UK, including BHS and Topshop, which were estimated to make up some 12% of the nation's clothing retail.

Green assisted his wife in the purchase of the Arcadia Group, which owned High Street chains such as Burton, Dorothy Perkins, Evans, Miss Selfridge, Outfit, Topshop/Topman and Wallis in 2002.

On November 3Oth 2020 the Arcadia Group went into administration.

Philip Green is not a man to be trusted to run a public company.

The £1.2 bn that was paid in 2005, and the £586 taken out in dividends, rental payments from BHS could have been reinvested back into Arcadia and BHS to make them more competitive in the Internet age.

Primark and ASOS also clothes retailers have flourished despite the Covid pandemic.

He sold a large public company for £1 to Chappell later jailed for six years. His incompetence is as large as his pay.

The response of both Labour and Conservative to Philip Green has been profoundly mistaken.

Labour knighted him in 2006.

Green was rewarded by the Tories in August 2010 when Cameron appointed him to lead a review of public sector efficiency.

The Conservative peer and former MP Lord Maude, commented: “We are extremely fortunate to have Sir Philip, with his immense commercial experience and of course his fantastic track record at managing large organisations, on board.”

It is hard to think of such unjustified trust that Labour and Tory Governments put in Philip Green.

All political parties should not uncritically worship the private sector, but maintain a constructive relationship with employers, employees, and keep the right distance.

Rupert Pitt

Winchester