A leading law firm has been drafted in to help scrutinise the conduct of former BHS directors prior to the high-street chain’s collapse.
Jones Day was appointed earlier this week by new joint administrators FRP Advisory – which itself was only brought in recently at the request of the Pension Protection Fund, BHS’s biggest creditor.
According to Sky News, the law firm will play a key role in investigating BHS’s financial transactions before and after Sir Philip Green sold the department store business to Retail Acquisitions for £1 in March 2015.
The 88-year-old retailer collapsed into administration earlier this year under the weight of a £571m pension deficit, having also suffered tough trading.
A hard-hitting report from MPs concluded that Green was ultimately responsible for BHS’s demise after selling the business to the “manifestly unsuitable” Dominic Chappell – the three times bankrupt who fronted the Retail Acquisitions consortium.
Green, whose knighthood is being reviewed by the Cabinet Office, is now under mounting pressure to plug the black hole in BHS’s pension scheme after vowing to “fix” the deficit when he appeared in front of a joint Work and Pensions and Business Innovation and Skills Committee.
The parliamentary inquiry scrutinised a host of property transactions involving BHS, the Green family and other entities, which Jones Day is poised to probe further.
It comes as BHS shutters its remaining stores, with all shops to close by August 20.
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