Furious MPs launch bid to strip Sir Philip Green of knighthood as he is branded ‘billionaire spiv’ in Commons
MP accuses Sir Philip Green of ‘stealing the rings from BHS’ finger’, beating it up and leaving it on life support
FURIOUS MPs last night launched a formal bid to strip Sir Philip Green of his knighthood after he was branded a “billionaire spiv” in the Commons.
In an extraordinary debate, MPs backed a motion calling for the tycoon to lose his gong over the collapse of BHS – calling it the “biggest corporate scandal of modern times”.
And last night Lib Dem backbencher Greg Mulholland kick-started the process by complaining to the Honours Forfeiture Committee.
This means senior civil servants must now review the knighthood awarded to Sir Philip under Tony Blair’s Labour Government a decade ago.
Mr Mulholland told the Sun: “I will be making a formal complaint and I urge my fellow MPs to join me.”
The move capped a brutal day for the larger than life stores boss as MPs tore into him over the demise of BHS.
Labour MP Iain Wright accused Sir Philip of treating BHS like a “giant piggy bank” by taking hundreds of millions in dividends while leaving a £571 million hole in the staff pension scheme.
He stormed: “He took the rings off BHS, beat it black and blue. He starved it of food and water and put it on life support and then wanted credit for keeping it alive.”
He said BHS was “one of the biggest corporate scandals of modern times”.
Frank Field compared him to Napoleon while Dennis Skinner likened him to the late media mogul Robert Maxwell – saying he had “robbed” employees.
Taking advantage of Parliamentary privilege, Labour’s David Winnick said: “I see Green as a billionaire spiv, a billionaire spiv who should never have received a knighthood.
“A billionaire spiv who has shamed British capitalism, and the least we can do today is to make our views clear and strong.”
More than 11,000 workers lost their jobs when BHS collapsed and thousands more face huge hits to their pension pots.
Sir Philip vowed to “sort” the pension blackhole in July. On Wednesday night he insisted he planned to meet the Pensions Regulator in a matter of days after spending the summer cruising the Med on his £100 million superyacht.
But furious MPs said they simply didn’t believe him. Tory Richard Fuller called on Sir Philip to stop talking and do the “honourable thing” by plugging the pensions blackhole.
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He said: “You can amass a great fortune but in turbulent times you can lose it in a day and all you are left with is your honour. The actions of Sir Philip may well have been legal but were the actions of Sir Philip honourable?
“This is pertinent as he received his honours for services to retail.”
Mr Fuller’s motion calling for Sir Philip’s knighthood to be “cancelled and annulled” was backed by 110 MPs even before the debate began.
Labour Shadow Business Secretary Clive Lewis condemned Sir Philip for using BHS as his “personal play thing”.
But he added the Government had to do more to protect high street workers. He said: “If all we do today is posture in condemnation of one man, we are doing little except indulge in competitive scapegoating.
“The most extraordinary thing about the whole affair is that legally, Sir Philip Green has done nothing wrong.
“We cannot escape our own responsibility for this affair.”
Only a handful of Brits have lost their knighthoods. Fred ‘The Shred’ Goodwin was stripped of his gong in February 2012 over the financial crisis.
Former spy Anthony Blunt lost his knighthood in 1979 after he confessed to supplying hundreds of secret documents to the Soviets.
Labour Shadow Minister Liz McInness suggested giving Sir Philip’s knighthood to a former BHS employee, Grant Atterbury.
He has been chronicling his experience since the business closed.
Downing Street said any decision on Sir Philip’s knighthood was for the forfeitures committee. A No.10 spokesman said: “That is an independent committee, the Government has no role at all.”
A spokesman for Sir Philip Green – who three days ago (Tues) said he was “very, very, very sorry” over BHS – declined to comment.
The Dishonours list: Other public figures who have had their gongs taken away
A number of public figures have been stripped of their titles over the years:
Jimmy Savile, January 2013: The television star was knighted for his services to charity in 1990 but the Honours Forfeiture Committee considered stripping him of the title posthumously when the scale of the paedophile's crimes emerged.
The Cabinet Office later said that he had ceased to be a member of the order upon his death in 2011.
Stuart Hall, October 2013: The former It's A Knockout presenter was made an OBE in 2012 for services to broadcasting and charity.
But the Queen directed it be cancelled after Hall, then 83, was handed a 30-month jail term for sexually abusing 13 victims, one as young as nine, over a period of nearly 20 years.
Vicky Pryce, July 2013: The economist was made a Companion of the Order of the Bath in 2009 in recognition of her contribution as head of the Government economic service.
But in March 2013 she and ex-husband Chris Huhne were both jailed for eight months for swapping speeding penalty points a decade earlier so he could avoid a driving ban, which only emerged when Ms Pryce approached newspapers after Mr Huhne left her for another woman.
She was released from prison after two months but, following her conviction, her name was removed from the Order of the Bath register.
Rolf Harris, March 2015: The former children's entertainer was stripped of his CBE after being jailed for almost six years for a string of sex attacks on girls as young as seven.
Harris, 86, was given the honour by the Queen a year after painting her portrait to mark her 80th birthday. He had also previously been awarded an MBE and an OBE.
Fred Goodwin, January 2012: Mr Goodwin received his knighthood for services to banking under the Labour government before guiding the Royal Bank of Scotland to the brink of collapse in 2008.
Queen's final call
THE secretive Honours Forfeiture Committee will review Sir Philip Green’s knighthood.
The independent committee is made up of senior civil servants who consider each case on its merits.
Any recommendations for forfeiture are then submitted through the PM to the Queen.
If she approves, the decision is announced in the London Gazette.
Shamed a nation
ONLY those convicted of an offence, accused of criminality or struck off professional bodies usually lose their gongs.
But Fred “The Shred” Goodwin was stripped of his in 2012 over the near collapse of Royal Bank of Scotland.
Soviet spy Anthony Blunt was stripped of his knighthood in 1978.
Superhead Jean Else had her honour annulled in 2011 for nepotism.