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Lex Greensill has sued the UK’s Department for Business and Trade over alleged misuse of private information, according to High Court records.
Details of the claim have not yet been made public. The lawsuit was filed last Thursday and has not been previously reported.
The Australian businessman’s company Greensill Capital, which counted former UK prime minister David Cameron as an adviser, collapsed in 2021 after failing to renew its insurance cover.
Greensill Capital’s demise unleashed one of the most prominent British lobbying scandals in a generation. A spokesperson for Lex Greensill declined to comment.
The legal proceedings came as the UK’s insolvency service, which is overseen by the business department, wrapped up an investigation into Greensill Capital. The findings of the probe are not yet public.
Lex Greensill faces the possibility of being disqualified as a company director for up to 15 years.
The Financial Times revealed in 2021 that Cameron had extensively lobbied the UK government to increase Greensill Capital’s access to Covid-19 loan schemes.
Lex Greensill, the son of an Australian melon farmer, enjoyed a privileged relationship with Whitehall officials as he built his supply-chain finance business.
At one point he had a desk and security pass within the Cabinet Office, according to the Boardman review into Greensill Capital and its ties to government. He received a CBE in 2017 “for services to the economy”.
Lex Greensill and Greensill Capital are now battling legal proceedings in multiple jurisdictions.
In Switzerland, Lex Greensill was named as a suspect alongside four former Credit Suisse bankers in a case that centred on mis-selling allegations in relation to the collapse of a $10bn set of the bank’s investment funds that were linked to Greensill Capital. His lawyer declined to comment at the time, citing an instruction from the Swiss prosecutor not to discuss the investigation.
One of Greensill’s major clients was GFG Alliance, the metals group of Sanjeev Gupta, which had borrowed $5bn from Greensill Capital. GFG is under investigation by the Serious Fraud Office over its financing arrangements with the firm. GFG has denied any wrongdoing.
According to the business department, taxpayers could be liable for £2mn in redundancy payments that were paid to staff of Greensill Capital’s management company by the National Insurance Fund.
In December, Kevin Hollinrake, minister for enterprise and markets, said that the Redundancy Payment Service had submitted a claim to Greensill Capital’s administrators in April last year. He said he was uncertain whether these funds would be recouped.
“Any funds available for distribution in an insolvent company will be paid out by the administrators in accordance with the statutory order of priority for creditor payments,” he said.
The business department did not respond to a request for comment. Downing Street said the government would not comment on active legal proceedings.
Additional reporting by Robert Smith
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