Ritz row rages on
Nephews blast billionaire uncle for ‘damaging business’
A FAMILY feud over the Ritz hotel turned into a war of words yesterday as Sir Frederick Barclay was accused by his nephews of damaging the family business.
They said the 85-year-old had tried to disrupt the sale of the world-famous hotel and had potentially disrupted the family’s business empire by ‘misleading’ the media. They threatened to sue him.
Sir Frederick said he was ‘baffled’ by their public statement, which came days after he released CCTV footage that allegedly showed his nephew Alistair, 30, handling a secret bugging device, inside an adaptor plug, at the five-star London hotel.
Billionaire Sir Frederick and his daughter Amanda have begun a legal action against three of his nephews over claims they bugged his conversations in the Ritz conservatory. He said he felt ‘betrayed’ by the sons of his twin brother Sir David Barclay.
The three nephews hit back in a rare public statement issued through the family holding company, Ellerman. They said Sir Frederick had not been directly involved in running the family businesses for almost 30 years and was not a director or an owner.
But he had given ‘misleading and damaging’ briefings to the media, and had conducted ‘uninformed conversations’ about sensitive commercial deals, they said. Sir Frederick’s behaviour had caused ‘distress to the wider family’. They denied his claims that he had From the Mail, February 29 found a buyer willing to pay £1.3billion for the Ritz, which sold earlier this year for around £750million. He had threatened to sue if it sold for under £1billion. They said the sale was a record price per room for a London hotel.
The statement accused Sir Frederick of using his legal action at the High Court to generate ‘selfserving and colourful publicity’, adding: ‘Taken alongside his interference in the sale process, this amounts to a pattern of behaviour that he must appreciate could only damage our reputation and the business interests of the family.’
Sir David and Sir Frederick accumulated a fortune by investing in property and business and their empire is now run through a family trust. It includes the Telegraph newspapers. Earlier this year Sir Frederick accused three of his nephews – Aidan, 64, Howard, 60, and Alistair – and Aidan’s son Andrew, 28, of bugging his conversations and breach of confidence.
In a statement, Sir Frederick insisted Aidan had ‘persuaded’ him to find buyers for the Ritz, and said he had achieved ‘two substantial offers of more than £1billion’.
He added: ‘This statement issued on behalf of my nephews is inaccurate, inept and ill-informed.’