UK Tax List: Sunday Times Tax List 2024 including Alex Gerko, Ed Sheeran and JK Rowling - HMRC's top payers

Former Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone secured the position of the second-largest taxpayer in the UK last year with a tax settlement exceeding half a billion pounds, according to the Sunday Times Tax List.

The 93-year-old millionaire businessman reached an agreement in October to settle £652.6 million in taxes owed to HM Revenue & Customs for the period spanning 1994 to 2012.

The sixth edition of the Tax List coincides with the rush of millions to meet the self-assessment deadline, and encompasses individuals from various sectors, including the music industry, the arts, billionaire aristocrats, gambling tycoons, car dealers, and scrap metal merchants.

Researchers from the Tax List identified Ecclestone as the second-highest individual taxpayer, slightly trailing behind Alex Gerko, the billionaire founder of XTX Markets.

They also noted that a significant portion of individuals from the previous year's list paid less tax in the current year, with two-thirds seeing a reduction.

This is thought to be mainly 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.

But two notable figures who have emerged as paying considerably higher taxes compared to the previous year are Ed Sheeran and JK Rowling. The Suffolk-born singer compensated himself with over £80 million and extensively toured last year, while the earnings of the Harry Potter creator continued to grow.

Rowling and Sheeran, the youngest single taxpayer, secured the 31st and 32nd= positions, respectively in this year's rankings, with estimated tax bills of £40 million and £39.6 million.

Who else was on the list?

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 Wetherspoons 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,” 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 Tax List top 10:

1. Alex Gerko (£664.5m) Moscow-born maths whizz turned trader has renounced his Russian citizenship
2. Bernie Ecclestone (£652.6m) A reluctant No 2, the 93-year-old Formula One tycoon paid more than £650m in tax and penalties to avoid jail
3. Denise, John and Peter Coates (£375.9m) Britain’s richest self-made woman co-launched Bet365 from a Stoke car park
4. Fred and Peter Done and family (£204.6m) Sons of an illegal bookie went legit with gambling giant Betfred
5. Sir Tim Martin (£167.1m) Named his pub group JD Wetherspoon after a teetotal teacher who said he would fail in life
6. Sir James Dyson and family (£156m) The world’s most successful vacuum cleaner salesman who has launched a higher education institute
7. The Weston family (£146.2m) The transatlantic family behind Primark and Fortnum & Mason have sold Selfridges
8. Mike Ashley (£139.4m) Jack Wills, House of Fraser, Game, and now MatchesFashion are all part of the Sports Direct tycoon’s empire
9. John Bloor (£118.1m) Former plasterer who got the Triumph Motorcycles brand back on the road
10. John Timpson and family (£99.8m) High street cobbler with a philanthropic soul