Philip Green

It's rare for one to be totally confirmed in your belief of the under laying ugly nature of a tycoon, his wealth, creating in his mind the special place he holds over ordinary mortals such as us and the bulling nature that ensues when power corrupts. You had only to watch Philip Green, the previous owner of BHS in his appearance before today's parliamentary committee to know you had seen one.

 The man exudes contempt. He has an ego to rival Donald Trump and his frighteningly thin skin takes offence at any sort of criticism. He must have been horrible to work for as he rounds on people questioning his motives with verbal contempt. At one point he accused one of the MPs sitting opposite him of staring at him. It was like the confrontation you might get in one of those less than salubrious bars where the local thug challenges you for looking at him. I have never seen this at the level of a professional hearing and it is probably indicative of his overall mental attitude towards other than a small group of similar minded power hungry individuals.

His confrontational attitude was acute from the get go. He was not there other than on his own terms and although he apologised for letting down his employees at British Home Stores he clearly did not believe he was at fault in any way, including the choice of the new owner who had little or no experience of major retailing and still less the cash to run the business.
He left the business of due diligence to others which I suppose highlights his interest in saving the business, a business he had put up for sale for a £1.00 but with a pension commitment shortfall of millions.
His apology to the employees was pure window dressing as he sat and in a sense humiliated his inquisitors by demanding to be questioned on his own terms and in a way that did not incriminate him.
Behind sat his impassive faced assistants, like the hard men supporting their Mafia boss in the traditional 1920s New York setting, these financial and legal hard men were the backdrop to what money can buy to insulate you from reality.
Green is a wealthy 'wide boy' something of a psychotic streak runs through his demeanour as he barely hides his irritation and contempt. Easily roused if the questioning became too pointed, he feigned the oldest defence, that he left 'that aspect' of the business to others and therefore could not be expected to know. When reminded that he was responsible as head of the business and signed off the financial statement it appears that was not the case, he had a firewall and others predominantly his wife signed and fulfilled the legal requirement for shareholding and ownership.
Before creating his wealth he had moved to Montecarlo because of health reasons and set up home there. It was incidental, he would have us believe, that the Monaco Principality was a tax haven and that leaving his wife and children there whilst he returned to the UK to set up his business was part of any plan. His shifty eyes glance around the assembled MPs as if to challenge any disbelief that not only does his wife have complete control whilst living outside the ambit of the British taxation system or that we should question the fact that the UK properties which his company owned were sold to a company in Monaco which his wife owns and are then leased back to the UK operation which pays a hefty rental to Mrs Green free from any obligation to pay tax.
He has no responsibility for the financial aspects of the company which he leaves to others.
He has no responsibility for the pension fund which he leaves to others.
He has no knowledge of the affairs of the Head Office in Monaco which his wife runs and where the profits of the UK business end up.
Sitting there batting each ball away with the aplomb of a "not me gov" East End barrow boy trader one is again left speechless, as I was listening to Mike Ashley the boss of Sports Direct at the lack of any sense of the common touch or of any moral integrity towards the employee, in Ashley's case the indiscriminate use of labour to meet the day to day vicissitude of weather and trading conditions and in Philip Greens case the bleeding of cash through dividends and the total lack of responsibility to fund the company pension fund which his employees were contributing 5% of their monthly salary whilst he shorted his legal responsibility for the companies 10% contribution leaving a shortfall, at the time he sold the company for a £1.00, of over £200 million of which he has offered to pay £10 million as a gesture.
Where was the Regulator in all this you might rightly ask, where indeed.