The Truth About BHS
The Briefing Room
BBC
4.8 • 731 Ratings
🗓️ 15 July 2016
⏱️ 28 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
BHS was one of the biggest names on the high street, but it is now in administration and faces an uncertain future. What exactly happened, and who is responsible for its decline?
Much of the focus has been on Sir Philip Green who sold the firm a little over a year ago to a little-known group called Retail Acquisitions. BHS had undergone a period of high growth during the first part of Green's 15 years of ownership, but its subsequent decline was accelerated by the economic crisis of 2008, and in recent years it racked up huge losses.
Many accuse Sir Philip Green of trying to offload the company to duck its growing pension liabilities - one MP even called him the "unacceptable face of capitalism" - but there have also been suggestions that he's being unfairly tried in the court of public opinion.
Green and the owners of Retail Acquisitions will face questions in front of a parliamentary select committee next month. Meanwhile the administrators are entertaining offers for BHS assets. Hanging in the balance are the company's 11,000 employees and more than 20,000 members of the company pension scheme.
David Aaronovitch asks what happened to the retailer, and who's responsible for its decline?
Producer/Reporter: Michael Wendling Researcher: Alex Burton
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hi, my name's Mike. I'm one of the producers here at the briefing room. And you've probably |
| 0:04.7 | heard a lot recently about BHS, the failed high street retailer. There's been parliamentary hearings. |
| 0:11.8 | Politicians have been arguing with Philip Green. He's the former owner of BHS. And although the |
| 0:17.7 | shops are still open, the company is being wound down. |
| 0:21.5 | More to the point, 11,000 jobs will go along with it. |
| 0:25.9 | Well, here at the briefing room, we looked into this story and some of the issues raised by it shortly after the firm went into administration. |
| 0:33.3 | So here's a program we recorded in May. |
| 0:48.6 | Good evening. Modern Living Made Easy. |
| 0:54.9 | That's the slogan of the retail store that for eight decades was the one on the high street that wasn't Woolworths. But BHS, British home stores, went into administration last month putting |
| 1:01.8 | 11,000 jobs in danger and revealing a pension fund deficit of £571 million. Modern living |
| 1:10.8 | made pretty difficult. |
| 1:13.6 | Recrimination drowned out lamentation. The finger of blame, as wielded by Frank Field MP, |
| 1:19.6 | chairman of the Commons Work and Pensions Committee, was pushed into the shoulder of the former boss of BHS, Sir Philip Green, who sold the company for a pound last spring. |
| 1:31.4 | The accusation is that the unbelievably wealthy Sir Philip handed over BHS to a cowboy outfit |
| 1:37.9 | and washed his hands of the consequences. Mr. Fields said Sir Philip should stump up the |
| 1:43.2 | 500 million pension deficit himself or lose his knighthood. |
| 1:47.0 | Cash for keeping on us, if you like. |
| 1:50.0 | But Sir Philip has his defenders. |
| 1:53.0 | Don't blame him, they argue. |
| 1:54.0 | Blame inexorable retail trends. |
| 1:57.0 | He might be mouty and extravagant, but what the tycoon did is what many others would |
| 2:02.2 | have done in his position. So, which is it? Heartless asset stripping or just the market at work? |
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