Tory MP made bankrupt as a result of £1.7m debt amid doubt over seat

Conservative MP Adam Afriyie has been made bankrupt after a choose in a specialist court docket heard how he owed round £1.7m.

Decide Nicholas Briggs made a chapter order towards the MP for Windsor at a web based listening to within the Insolvency and Corporations Courtroom on Tuesday.

The choose was advised that Mr Afriyie owed about £1m to HM Income & Customs (HMRC) and about £700,000 to Barclays.

Regardless of the chapter order, Mr Afriyie insisted on Tuesday that he won’t be standing down as an MP till the overall election anticipated in 2024.

Beneath Commons guidelines, bankruptcies can disqualify MPs and even spark by-elections if the debt just isn’t cleared inside six months.

However an MP is simply disqualified instantly in the event that they obtain a chapter restrictions order – made if an individual’s conduct is discovered to have been “dishonest, reckless or in any other case culpable”.

In a press release on Tuesday, he stated: “It’s a traumatic time and it’ll be powerful for some time, however I’m removed from the one particular person in a troublesome place, and I’ll proceed to do my finest to assist my constituents till the subsequent common election, after I’ll be standing down.”

The MP stated his chapter adopted “enterprise failures a while in the past”, including: “I’m finally liable for a number of the financial institution borrowing by private assure. I’ve been attempting to promote our residence and downsize for a while, but it surely’s a troublesome market.”

In Could, one other choose accredited a plan for Mr Afriyie to promote a property. The Windsor MP, who didn’t attend the listening to, had written asking for extra time to promote the property.

The Tory backbencher wished proceedings adjourned till March and stated he might repay his money owed in full if the property was offered.

Representatives of HMRC and Barclays had given the choose element of how a lot was owed and opposed an adjournment.

Decide Briggs concluded: “There have been six hearings already of this matter so time actually has run out. I shall make a chapter order.

He added: “It appears to me there is no such thing as a proof of there being any cheap prospects of paying money owed in full.”

Barrister Fiona Whiteside, who represented Barclays, stated the financial institution had “misplaced persistence” over the debt, and added: “We have now seen no credible proof that the property shall be offered any time quickly.”

Mr Afriyie was elected again in 2005. Information of attainable chapter proceedings involving Mr Afriyie first emerged in late 2019.

The MP arrange the IT agency Join Assist Providers in 1993. However the agency went into insolvency in 2017 – having reportedly substantial money owed with HMRC.