Bet365’s Coates family top Sunday Times taxpayer list again

The annual Sunday Times Tax List 2021 also showed that Betfred founders Fred and Peter Done paid the third highest tax in the country.

The majority of those featured on the list paid less in tax than they did the year before. However, Denise, John and Peter Coates – Bet365’s co-chief executives and chairman, respectively – saw their tax bill more than double from £276m when they first topped the list in the 2018-19 fiscal year to £573m in 2019-20.

This, the newspaper said, was partly due to a change in methodology, with betting duty now also included among the taxes measured.

That change also saw Betfred founders Fred and Peter Done jump from 22nd on last year’s list with a £44.5m tax bill to third this year with £191m.

For Coates, corporation and payroll taxes made up more than £200m of the total paid, with General Betting Duty and taxes and salaries and dividends making up most of the remainder.

The Sunday Times noted that Coates’ wealth would be enough to pay 67,725 state pensions for a year.

The Done brothers, on the other hand, paid £127.2m in various gambling duties including General Betting Duty, Machine Gaming Duty and Gaming Duty. They paid a further £25.6m in corporation and payroll taxes and £3.9m in taxes on dividends.

The list also estimated the Coates family’s total wealth at £7.10bn, the fourth-highest on the 50-member list. The Done brothers, meanwhile, were estimated to have a net worth of £1.20bn.