Cleaning company director binned for sweeping away HMRC’s money

THE director of Leeds-based cleaning company Morris Morris (MMUK) has been disqualified for paying himself instead of the taxman.

Paul Morris’ disqualification as a director for six years which starts on Boxing Day, follows an investigation by the Insolvency Service. MMUK entered creditors’ voluntary liquidation in 2011, with a deficiency of £159,317.

Mr Morris, who lives in Aberford near Leeds, gave an undertaking to the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills not to act as a director until 2019. In the undertaking, he did not dispute that between April 20 2010 and October 11 2011, he caused MMUK to pay him £93,622 through his director’s loan account.

The investigation showed Mr Morris’s director’s loan account was already overdrawn by £60,107 prior to these transactions and by the date of liquidation this had grown to £153,729.

During the period that Mr Morris paid himself, the company was in tax arrears. At liquidation, MMUK owed HM Revenue and Customs £78,108 and £63,321in VAT and PAYE/NIC respectively.

Mr Morris’s disqualification, Robert Clarke, head of insolvent investigations north at the Insolvency Service, said: “This disqualification shows that the Insolvency Service will vigorously pursue directors who seek to benefit from money which should have been used to pay tax. Removing him from the marketplace should serve as a warning to all who indulge in such practices.”