£60m boost for billionaire’s firm

A FIRM owned by a billionaire tax exile benefited from grants of almost £60million after its employees took key up positions on LEP boards.

Peel Group staff were able to sit in on meetings at which vast public grants that helped their firm were backed or agreed.

In one case, more than £16million was signed off to improve train links to Liverpool Airport – which Peel Group owns a major share of. The decision was taken while Peel Group director Robert Hough was chairing the LEP board.

Although he declared his interest, the minutes make clear that Mr Hough took part in discussions and ‘voted thereon’.

In another case, it was agreed that £35million of taxpayers’ money should be spent on Liverpool’s port – in which Peel Group also has a significant stake. The decision was made after an LEP board – which included a Peel executive – backed the project. Former Chancellor George Osborne (pictured right with a Peel worker) visited the port in 2013. After the Mail found the payments, officials from the LEP went to extraordinary lengths to conceal the involvement of Peel staff on the boards. And they refused to release records of the meetings.

Peel Group is owned by a family trust of billionaire John Whittaker, based on the Isle of Man, and by Saudi company Olayan Group.

Liverpool City Region LEP and Peel Group said no payments had been made directly to the firm. Peel Group said the train scheme ‘is not a Peel scheme’, adding that the group ‘do not recognise assertions about a socalled conflict of interest’. The LEP said the scheme had to be approved by a body called the Combined Authority. However, Mr Hough was also on this board. On the port funding, a spokesman said: ‘Other than offering a letter of support, the LEP played no role in the application or receipt of this grant’.