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14
Sept 2023
Employees to get little from Ilke Homes settlement, document reveals
A new document published by the administrators of failed housebuilder Ilke Homes has revealed that its debts are far greater than previously believed, and that employees stand to gain little from any settlement.
Ilke Homes collapsed into administration in June, causing the loss of 1,100 jobs and leaving a long list of creditors wondering when they might get any money back – and how much they might receive.
A Statement of Affairs published on the government’s Companies House website two weeks ago appeared to show that the company left debts of about £320 million, but it transpires that that figure applied only to Ilke Homes Limited (IHL), which is one of three companies currently in administration by AlixPartners.
The other two, Ilke Homes Land Limited (IHLL) and Ilke Homes Holdings Limited (IHHL), were part of the same operation and have also left debts, of £52.8 million and £23.9 million respectively.
The total combined sum of the three companies’ debts amounts to £397.95 million.
Read more:
- Collapsed Flaxby firm Ilke Homes owed £320m to 300 creditors
- 600 Ilke Homes staff join legal action over job losses
- Ilke Homes: More than 1,000 staff made redundant
The document also details how much various creditors are likely to receive. For example, IHL owes 1,061 employees a total of £724,614 in the form of holiday pay and pension arrears – an average debt of £683 per person – but the statement lists this debt as being payable at “nil” pence in the pound, meaning they will get nothing.
By contrast, secured creditors will receive the full amount owed to them. For example, IHL is expected to repay the whole of its £221,000 debt to Barclays Bank, but none of its £2.2 million debt to HMRC. In all, it is expected to repay £326,000, or just 0.1%, of its £321 million total debt.
IHLL is expected to repay its debts to secured creditors Redlawn Land Ltd (£7.7 million) and Barclays Bank (£5.4 million) in full. Claims from HMRC of £279,743 and from former employees of £43,258 are also expected to be paid in full, but other unsecured creditors are expected to receive just £694,000 of the £39.4 million they are owed.
In the case of IHHL, the amounts of repayments to unsecured creditors, who are collectively owed nearly £23.9 million, are listed as “uncertain”.
The three Ilke companies collectively owe Homes England £68.7 million, a sum which appears on all three of their balance sheets due to a system of cross-guarantees. Of this debt, IHL will repay £105,000, IHLL will repay £1.005 million, and IHLL will repay just £30,000. In total, Ilke will repay just £1.14 million of its £68.7 million debt to the government agency.
In all, the three Ilke Homes companies are expected to pay off £15,478,001 of their debts – or just 2.9% of the total.
This story was updated on September 20. A previous version wrongly stated that Ilke's total debts exceeded half a billion pounds. This was because the £68.7 million that Ilke owes to Homes England appears as a liability on the balance sheets of all three Ilke companies, as they have all guaranteed it, and so was counted three times instead of just once.
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