Region scores highly on Rich List
THE North West has more members on the Sunday Times Rich List than any English region outside the South East.
Some 60 people on the list, which was published yesterday, were listed as being born or based in the region, compared with 529 from London and the South East, 42 from Yorkshire, and 31 from the West Midlands.
Adding up the wealth of the ten wealthiest people from each region, the North West finished fourth (£16bn) behind Greater London (£83.2bn), the South East (£22.9bn) and the West Midlands (£16.3bn).
The ten richest people from the region to make the list came largely from property or retail backgrounds. The Duke of Westminster, whose ancestral home is at Eaton Hall in Cheshire, topped the North West list with an estimated wealth of £7.35bn.
The Duke, whose property company Grosvenor owns the Liverpool One development, was one of four billionaires listed as being from the region.
The others were Peel Group founder John Whittaker (£2.2bn), European Metals Recycling founder Robin Sheppard (£1.2bn) and Lord Grantchester and the Moores Family, who sold off the Littlewoods business in two chunks over the past decade.
The owners of Liverpool-based discount chains Home Bargains and B&M Bargains also shot up the list as discount retail sales boomed. Tom Morris and family, whose TJ Morris business owns Home Bargains, climbed by 38 places to 136th in the list, with an estimated wealth of £620m, while B&M Bargains owners Simon, Bobby and Robin Arora climbed 47 places to 183rd, with a wealth of £343m.
One of the big climbers on the list was Michael Oliver of Knutsford-based Oliver Valves, who climbed 260 places to 263rd, with a wealth of £344m.
Mr Oliver founded his business off the back off a single innovative valve he created in his garage in 1979. His company won the North West Exporter prize at TheBusinessDesk.com’s North West Masters event last Thursday.
