Llanelli MP Fights For Roadchef Employees

Llanelli MP fights for Roadchef employees

Llanelli’s MP Nia Griffith has written to HMRC to press them to resolve their dispute with the Roadchef Employee Benefits Trust. Over 4,000 current and former Roadchef workers have been waiting for four years to receive money recovered from a former CEO of the company who misappropriated funds from employees’ share-option scheme around 20 years ago.

Ms Griffith met with a group of former Roadchef employees living in the Llanelli constituency earlier this month. She raised the impact of HMRC’s refusal to release the funds from the settlement on the employees in her constituency in her letter to the Deputy Chief Executive of HMRC, requesting he meet with the Trustees and resolve the dispute urgently.

HMRC is refusing to allow the Roadchef Employees Benefits Trust to distribute the funds recovered from the 2014 settlement with former Roadchef CEO Ingram Hill until the Trustees drop their pursuit of £10m paid in tax on the misappropriated funds to HMRC in 2000.

Nia Griffith MP said, “It quite frankly appalling that this dispute with HMRC has gone on for so long. The withholding of this money has had an appalling impact on those affected, and constituents of mine have written to me over the last year to express their frustration and despair.

“A large number of those affected were on low pay when they worked for Roadchef and do not have substantial pension or other incomes now. This money would make a huge difference to their lives, and they quite simply cannot wait any longer. It was clear from my meeting with my constituents that the ongoing uncertainty over the dispute is causing real anxiety.

“I explained all this in my letter to HMRC’s Deputy Chief Executive, and urged him to meet with the Chairman of the Trustees right away. I understand that HMRC is contesting whether it should return the £10m paid in tax on the misappropriated funds, but they simply must get around the table and work to resolve this dispute as a matter of urgency.”

“There can be no more excuses for this failure of duty to low paid workers around the country.”