The York Area contains some of the top 100 people or families who have paid the highest amount of tax.

The city’s top taxpayer, according to the Sunday Times newspaper, is the Shepherd family, who paid £35.1million in tax over the past 12 months.

The family sold their York-based construction business in 2015 and now concentrate on Portakabin- the portable and modular buildings company, which is based in Huntington.

The Sunday Times Tax list says the family are the second-biggest taxpayers in Yorkshire.

READ MORE:

The county’s top taxpayer is Malcolm Healey, the founder of Wren Kitchens, who paid £52.1million in tax, and owns an estate close to York.

His kitchen company hit £1 billion in sales last year, making him Yorkshire’s richest man, worth £1.43billion, according to the 2021 Sunday Times Rich List or £1.65bn in 2023, according to Business Insider.

The Hull-born 79-year-old founded Wren Kitchens in Howden in 2009. Now, based at Barton-upon-Humber, it has a chain of more than 400 stores.

Malcolm Healey currently owns Warter Priory, a 12,000-acre estate situated three miles East of Pocklington, which he bought for a reported £48 million in 1998. He is ranked 21 on the national list.

York Press: A Wren centre

Yorkshire’s top taxpayers also include Mark Hunter and Andrew Vincent, who founded Leeds-based software and IT services company BJSS.

The Tordoff family, who run Bradford-based car retailers JCT600, also made the list alongside fellow care retailer Richard and Christine Teatum, who own Doncaster-headquartered Stoneacre, who also have dealerships around the region.

Nationally, thanks to a major tax settlement with HMRC, Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone became the second-biggest tax payer in the UK last year, the Sunday Times Tax List has suggested.

The millionaire businessman, 93, in October agreed a £652.6 million settlement over tax that he was meant to pay to HM Revenue & Customs during 18 years starting in 1994.

The Tax List researchers said Mr Ecclestone was the second-highest individual taxpayer in the country as a result, a little behind Alex Gerko, the billionaire founder of trading firm XTX Markets.

They said that two-thirds of the people who were on last year's list paid less tax this year.

Mostly this was because people's businesses made less profit last year, but it comes at a time when the Office for Budget Responsibility expects the UK tax burden to hit a post-war high before the end of the decade.

Third on the list were Denise, John and Peter Coates, the family behind online gambling giant Bet365. They paid £375.9 million.

The gambling fortune of Fred and Peter Done and family put them in fourth place at £204.6 million, closely followed by Wetherspoon founder Sir Tim Martin.

"This has been the highest taxing government since the Second World War and although the total tax take is up - it is only by 3.3%," said Tax List compiler Robert Watts.

"Bernie Ecclestone seems to have saved Jeremy Hunt's blushes. The total tax found in this year's research would have been a wedge lower were it not for the vast sum shelled out by the Formula One tycoon to settle a long-running investigation."

The researchers said that Akshata Murty, the wife of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, was liable for tax of around £4.8 million after she gave up her non-dom status following political pressure. It was not enough to get her included on the list.

"If you look at the bottom 98 in this year's list they paid £4.03 billion, £200 million less than last year," Mr Watts said.

"That's the amount the Government pledged to the NHS to boost winter resilience. Two thirds of the wealthy individuals in 2023's Tax List were found to have paid less tax this year.

"That was usually because their businesses have reported lower profits. But lower tax receipts from the UK's richest people may raise more than the odd eyebrow at a time when the public finances remain stretched and there is talk of Budget giveaways in the air."

The top 8 tax payers in Yorkshire

  1. Malcolm Healey (£52.1m, 21st nationally)
  2. The Shepherd family (£35.1m, 35th)
  3. Mark Hunter (£25m, 48th)
  4. Andrew Vincent (£25m, 48th)
  5. The Tordoff family (£17.4m, 66th)
  6. Richard and Christine Teatum (£16.7m, 68th)
  7. Frank Hester (£14.8m, 73rd)
  8. The Bailey family (£10.8m 95th)

Top 10 taxpayers in the UK

  1. Alex Gerko – £664.5m
  2. Bernie Ecclestone – £652.6m
  3. Denise, John and Peter Coates – £375.9m
  4. Fred and Peter Done and family – £204.6m
  5. Sir Tim Martin – £167.1m
  6. Sir James Dyson and family – £156m
  7. The Weston family – £146.2m
  8. Mike Ashley – £139.4m
  9. John Bloor £118.1m
  10. John Timpson and family – £99.8m