OFFSHORE TRUST OF 'PATRIOT' TICE

Reform deputy leader put in millions of pounds in shares

- NICKS SOMMERLAD

REFORM UK deputy leader Richard Tice put millions of pounds worth of shares in his property empire in an offshore trust.

The multi-millionaire businessman admits he set up a family trust in the Channel Islands tax haven of Jersey more than three decades ago.

He told the Mirror he created it during a two-year stint working in Paris in his mid-20s.

He kept it offshore when he returned to Britain in 1991 and only moved the trust from Jersey to the UK "five years ago... give or take" despite living here throughout those 28 years.

Mr Tice, 59, said the trust, called the RJS Tice Family Settlement, was set up to avoid being "double taxed" on his "international investments".

In 2016, when it was still offshore in Jersey, he transferred a million of his shares in his UK property business Quidnet Reit Ltd into the trust. Quidnet owns £32million worth of commercial property in the UK and the trust now owns a 17% stake, which is worth about £3m.

Mr Tice told us the beneficiaries of the trust were his three kids with his ex-wife and insisted they are all UK taxpayers like him. The trust was listed by his company Quidnet as having an address in Jersey as recently as July 2021.

He said this was just a correspondence address and that he had already brought the trust onshore to the UK.