Petition to strip Sir Philip Green of knighthood reaches more than 200,000 signatures

A petition calling for Sir Philip Green’s knighthood to be taken away has reached more than 203,000 signatures.

The petition, started by Sophia Mepham, comes shortly after the retail mogul’s Arcadia Group went into administration last month.

Arcadia includes high street brands Topshop, Dorothy Perkins and Burton.

While the company looks to find a buyer for all or parts of it, employees who enrolled in Arcadia pension schemes have an uncertain future.

If the retail company’s pension schemes go into the official rescue scheme, the Pension Protection Fund, employees are at risk of losing at least 10 per cent of the money they had originally been told they would receive when they retire. 

In the wake of Arcadia falling into administration, its pension scheme is operating under an estimated £350m deficit.

Green’s family is set to pay £50m into the scheme within the next 10 days. However, the Greens benefitted from a £1.2bn dividend from the company in 2005, in addition to more than £300m in interest payments on loans and rents on properties that they owned.

The business secretary, Alok Sharma, has called for an investigation into the handling on Arcadia, writing to the government’s Insolvency Service and asking it to look at the conduct of directors at Arcadia to see “whether their actions caused detriment to pension schemes”.

Now, the petition to the government’s Forfeiture Committee to remove Green’s knighthood, which he received in 2006 for “for services to the retail industry”, is blaming the businessman for “putting people’s livelihoods in jeopardy”.

“For a number of years the Arcadia Group has continued to spiral into financial turmoil, ending in the Arcadia Group going in to administration on 30 November 2020,” it states. 

“Putting 13,000 jobs at risk, along with over 10,000 of the employees pensions pots at risk of being cut.”

The petition goes on to accuse Green of “mismanagement” and states that he no longer “deserves” his knighthood.

It comes as one member of staff at Arcadia said the businessman should sell his £100m super-yacht in Monaco, where he has resided since 1998, to help the employees who face redundancy.

“I think [Philip Green] should sell his yacht and take money out of his own pocket to help his staff, to make sure people aren’t going to be without money for Christmas,” they told the BBC anonymously.

On Thursday, Labour MP Ed Miliband told the House of Commons that Green “owes the workers at Arcadia a moral duty”. 

"The workers at Arcadia should not pay the price of Philip Green's greed. So will the minister now publicly call for him to make good any shortfall in the pensions scheme and will he ensure that the pensions regulator takes all possible steps to make sure this happens?"

Green famously sold the department store BHS for £1  one year before the company fell into administration in 2016 with a £571m pension deficit.

After facing pressures from the Pensions Regulator, the mogul ultimately paid £353m to help support the BHS scheme.

In order for a knighthood to be revoked, it must be considered by the government’s Forfeiture Committee and then, if approved, the request will be submitted to the prime minister and then the Queen, who will have the final say.