Private equity financier Nick Ferguson is to become chairman of Savills in May.
Ferguson’s CV includes his current role as chairman of Sky Plc, co-founder and chairman of private equity group Schroder Ventures - later Permira - and chairman of SVG Capital plc, a publicly quoted private equity group.
He is also currently chairman of Alta Advisers Limited, an investment advisory firm, and is chairman and founder of Kilfinan Group, which provides mentoring to charities.
However, Ferguson is likely to be best known for his comments back in 2007 when he exposed some of the idiosynchrasies of the British tax system by suggesting that his cleaner was likely to be paying more tax than he did, or that paid by many senior executives.
“Any common sense person would say that a highly-paid private equity executive paying less tax than a cleaning lady or other low-paid workers, that can’t be right” he told the Financial Times at the time.
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Good idea that to get other people to pay for you!
If only a way to get other agents to pay for your marketing too!
“Any common sense person would say that a highly-paid private equity executive paying less tax than a cleaning lady or other low-paid workers, that can’t be right”
Well, maybe if he didn't find loopholes to dogde the taxes he really owed that wouldn't have been the case. It's like Google saying they've done nothing wrong because their tax avoidance was legal. You could argue that they had a point - that a better tax system wouldn't be manipulated or abused so easily - but you also have to question the morality of a massive corporation paying a fraction of the tax they owe or a high-flying executive paying less than his cleaner.
I'm sure Mr Ferguson will fit in very well to the high-end world of Savills, though.
SOunds like a nice bloke!
Exactly what I was thinking!
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