More of what we wouldn’t have known if it hadn’t been for Peter Hain
Jim Carroll

This morning's Times
GREEN WAS ‘A BULLY WHO JUST WANTED TO FLEECE SUPPLIERS AND RIP OFF CUSTOMERS’
Deirdre Hipwell Retail Editor
A former Topshop executive has accused Sir Philip Green of being a bully and a mediocre retailer from whom she had to “protect” her team when she worked at the fashion chain.
In a stinging criticism of the troubled billionaire, Jane Shepherdson said there was “no question” that Sir Philip was a bully who always wanted to “screw the supplier” and “rip off the customer”.
Ms Shepherdson said: “When I first came across him I was fortunate that Topshop was very successful so there wasn’t the power imbalance. He didn’t bully me, he would try to, he would get very angry and shout a lot. And I would get very angry and shout a lot.
“I had brought on this incredibly tal¬ented team of people to work at Top¬shop. There was no way I would have them exposed to the way Philip ran his business. I felt it was my duty to protect my team.” she told an event hosted by The Daily Telegraph yesterday,
Ms Shepherdson, a former brand director at Topshop, is the most senior former colleague of Sir Philip, the driv¬ing force behind Arcadia Group’s Top-shop, Miss Selfridge, Dorothy Perkins and Burton brands, to speak out against him since he was outed as the business¬man accused of bullying and sexual harassment by staff, who are alleged to have been “gagged” as part of settle¬ment agreements.
Sir Philip was named in the House of Lords by the former Labour cabinet minister Lord Hain under parliament¬ary privilege, despite a court order preventing details of the case from being made public. Sir Philip has cate¬gorically denied any wrongdoing, in¬cluding suggestions that he was guilty of unlawful sexual or racist behaviour.
The undermining of the privacy in¬junction is a further blow to the retail magnate whose reputation was badly damaged after he sold BHS for £1 to a consortium led by Dominic Chappell, a three times-bankrupt, in 2015.
The chain’s failure a year later led to condemnation of Sir Philip, despite him pumping £363 million into BHS’s pen¬sion schemes last year.
Retail analysts claim that Topshop has not been the same since Ms Shep¬herdson left. When she took over as brand director in 1998 Topshop had an annual profit of more than £9 million. It had risen to about £110 million by the time she left in 2006.
Topshop did continue to grow sales and profits strongly after Ms Shep¬herdson left and many members of her team did stay on with the chain. It is only in the past few years that trading has become much tougher.
Yesterday, Ms Shepherdson, who stepped down as chief executive of Whistles, a fashion brand, in 2016, said she did not think Sir Philip had ever been a very good retailer. “His view was if I screw the supplier enough I can get the price up enough and then I can rip off the customer. He was a dealer, he wasn’t a great retailer in any sense, and knew very little about fashion.”
Ms Shepherdson also said she never saw Sir Philip harass anyone sexually, adding: “That’s not to say it didn't happen, but I didn’t see it.” Sir Philip declined to comment.