3 months to settle your Bill, Roache..
Corrie Ken selling his house to cover 6-figure unpaid tax
CORONATION Street legend Bill Roache has been given three months to clear his debt to HMRC.
At a 33-second court hearing yesterday morning, a specialist judge was told the actor needed to sell his home in order to settle the bill.
The 91-year-old, who has played Ken Barlow in the soap since 1960, did not appear at court yesterday.
The case was adjourned for 12 weeks, until June 10, for the property in Wilmslow, Cheshire, to be sold and the remaining balance paid off.
The amount owed was not revealed in court but last month it was reported the actor had a £546,000 tax bill. The debt owed has been reduced due to payments made, Jacquille Jarrett, representing HMRC, told the hearing.
It is understood Bill is the highestpaid member of the cast, earning around €293,000 a year.
Retired Insolvency and Companies Court judge Stephen Baister granted the adjournment, which was not opposed by lawyers for HMRC.
In 2018, the Mirror told how Bill faced a huge bill after investing in a €586million Cayman Islands tax avoidance scheme.
It was not known how much he had paid into Twofold First Services LLP. But he was one of 288 investors who entered the scheme and put in, on average, €2.05m. Papers showed he joined the scheme in
March 2012.
It involved claiming tax relief from the artificial losses of a landowning business. The complex arrangement meant investors could use the paper loss to reduce their income tax outgoings.
A tribunal later ruled in favour of
HMRC, which successfully argued Twofold was “a tax avoidance arrangement”.
It was branded “abusive and artificial” by the British Treasury.
The Mirror reported last month how
Bill was “doing fine” despite the impending hearing at the High Court in Central London.
At a meeting of his Stride for Truth group, one member said they were “100% supporting their friend”, who was previously declared bankrupt in 1999.
The organisation, which strives for world peace and enlightenment, meets in a room above a foot clinic in Ashton-under-lyne, Greater Manchester.