Beverley House (9000), the UK parent group of Green Isle Foods in Naas, Co Kildare paid £1.39 million (€2.1 million) in corporate tax on behalf of its Irish subsidiary last year, according to accounts filed recently. Ciarán Hancockreports.
Based on Ireland's 12.5 per cent corporation tax rate, this would suggest that the Irish food company, which makes the Goodfella's and San Marco pizza brands, earned pretax profits of at least £11.1 million (€16.6 million) last year.
The figure is listed in notes to the accounts as "overseas tax" and relates to 12 months to April 1st, 2006. The accounts, lodged recently with the Companies' Office, show that the tax figure for last year was only marginally ahead of that paid in 2005.
The only entities that Beverley House owns outside the UK are Green Isle Foods and a company called Billcrest Products, which is incorporated in the State and conducts research and development activity and manages patents.
Northern Foods, Green Isle's ultimate parent and a stock market-quoted group, posted a pretax loss, after exceptional items, of £16.1 million over the same period. This indicates the importance of Green Isle to Northern Foods' overall operation.
Both Green Isle and Northern Foods declined to comment on the accounts.
The accounts also show that the deficit in Green Isle's defined-benefit pension scheme declined from £4.2 million to just more than £3 million in the 12-month period.
This followed an actuarial review of the pension scheme by Mercer Human Resource Consulting, which had the effect of adjusting the valuations attributed to its investments in equities, bonds, property and "other" assets.
The total "fair value" of these investments increased from £6.5 million to £9.3 million during the period. Its liabilities, meanwhile, increased at a more modest rate, from £11.2 million to £12.8 million.
Green Isle has previously stated that it has annual turnover of €250 million. Pizza sales are believed to account for about two-thirds of its turnover with 60 per cent of sales relating to exports to the UK.
Its pizza production is based at two sites in Co Kildare and one in Co Longford. They employ more than 600 staff, making pizzas under the Goodfella's and San Marco brands as well as producing own-label pizzas for UK and Irish supermarket groups, including Tesco, Superquinn, Dunnes Stores, Sainsbury's, Iceland and Asda.
Goodfella's is its star performer with a 26 per cent share of the chilled pizza market in the UK, according to figures published by Northern Foods.
Green Isle, which is headed by Kieran Carolan, was originally established in 1982 as Poldy's Fresh Foods. It was acquired by Northern Foods, a stock market-listed group, and has grown to become Ireland's biggest manufacturer of frozen food products.
It employs more than 1,300 staff and its other brands include Green Isle, Grassington's, Ross and Donegal Catch. It also produces own labels for supermarket groups.
