The members are shareholders too. As they partied, we are told, their investment of up to £270,000 nearly doubled in the first year. The announcement that founder Alistair Paton is opening a Mint in Hong Kong has been met with a blaze of publicity. So I was amazed to hear that the club has just lost its third chairman in a year.
Duncan Bannatyne, the entrepreneur and star of the BBC’s Dragon’s Den, has just quit after the departure, first, of David Horwell, the shipping magnate, and then Sebastian Sainsbury, of supermarket fame. Although none gave reasons, my moles say each felt uncomfortable with Paton’s management style.
Intrigued, I did some more digging and found that Paton has a reputation for exaggerating. Several people close to Mint said few of the celebs connected to the club are actually members, and the profits are smaller than reported. One insider said: “The list I saw has nobody of note. They may have been sent the marketing literature, but they didn’t join.”
Separately, I’ve heard Gordon Ramsay, the feisty chef who owns the club’s leasehold, has fallen out with Paton over alleged rent arrears.
I’m sure there’s an explanation for all this but if Paton, who was uncontactable, wants to attract celebrities, he needs to get on with those he hires.
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Have a flutter on footballers’ wives
WITH the pressure temporarily eased after England’s qualification for the next round of the World Cup, Britain’s bookies are now offering a flutter on footballers’ wives.
Paddy Power is taking bets on everything from the most pictured wife or girlfriend, such as Cheryl Tweedy, left, to the one most likely to announce a pregnancy after the tournament.
Meanwhile, Sporting Index says that big bets have been placed on Posh — otherwise known as Mrs Victoria Beckham — getting to each match first because the others will feel rough from partying the night before.
Two-jobs Turnbull’s conflict resolution
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THE alleged fraud at Dunlop Haywards, the surveying firm, is all rather embarrassing given that it is a subsidiary of the property conglomerate Erinaceous, whose chairman Nigel Turnbull is the author of the eponymous report on risk management and internal controls.
There is, of course, no suggestion of any widespread corruption at the firm; the problem appears to have been limited to the City of London office, which has now been closed.
Nevertheless, to ensure that everything is right and proper and that he was doing the correct thing, Turnbull has called in Risk Advisory Group to check the firm over. Great, apart form the fact that Turnbull is also chairman of ... Risk Advisory Group.
A conflict of interest surely? Not at all, splutters a spokesman for Dunlop Haywards, who insists that the fact everyone was aware of the conflict meant it was no longer a conflict. That’s a new principle.