The kitchen table campaigner
Every Saturday morning since the Autumn Budget, William Lees-Jones, the Managing Director of JW Lees, Manchester’s oldest brewery, has sat at his kitchen table posting on social media. There’s nothing unusual in that perhaps. Except William’s posts on LinkedIn have become a public catalogue of his views and opinions of the changes to BPR and how they will impact family businesses – views that have won him a big following (and a few critics), sparked national media coverage and honourable mentions in the House of Commons. When I heard the Chancellor’s statement I thought, you know what I’m actually going to become a one-person campaign “I’m just going to keep banging on about this. It may be quite boring and it may be something people disagree with … I don’t think my wife is a huge fan. She thinks I should be taking the bins out or something.” William joined JW Lees in 1994 driven by a deep sense of pride, duty and the privilege of building JW Lees legacy for the future. “When I joined the business, not much was written or known about family business. These private companies were very secretive. I remember my father being appalled when I got hold of a copy of the company’s accounts off the internet – Companies House I think. Why didn’t you just ask, he said? But you know I’m just incredibly proud of the fact that we’ve created more than 1,000 jobs in the last 30 years taking little old JW Lees to over 1,700 colleagues working in the family business. “But now this” he says. “A Political decision has been made and who knows it might be unmade?” William has been on the front foot campaigning for change, meeting his local MPs and writing to the Chancellor and Prime Minister. In conversations has had with Ministers, politicians and the media, he doesn’t feel anyone really understands the enormity of the challenge that’s been created.
William Lees-Jones Managing Director of JW Lees
on this brewery. It would be turned into a housing estate. My father, who still owns a large share in the business is 91. We have no time to plan. “Our philosophy has always been to reinvest in the business. Now our mindset is to do whatever it takes so that we can protect it and all of the colleagues and suppliers who rely on JW Lees. Countless businesses will close because of inheritance taxes.” William tells the story of the Strangeways brewery, home of Boddingtons the “Cream of Manchester” as a salutary lesson of what can happen when family businesses are acquired. Sold by the last family Chair, Ewart Boddington, to Whitbread in 1989, Boddingtons was then sold on to AB InBev in 2000 before being closed in 2005 and the building demolished in 2007. The Boddingtons brand is retained as what William calls a “supermarket beer.” He is no stranger to campaigning on issues he cares about. During the Covid-19 pandemic, for example, he was a loud voice lobbying for pubs to be kept open. Until we went into lockdown, we had never actually had a law about when pubs had to close. Even during the War pubs were open.
If JW Lees had to be sold for tax reasons, nobody would spend money
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