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Katie Price declared bankrupt for second time in five years over unpaid £750,000 tax bill
18 March 2024, 18:42
Katie Price has been declared bankrupt for a second time over an unpaid tax bill worth more than £750,000 and may face losing her home unless HMRC can recover the money.
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The former glamour model, who was previously declared bankrupt in 2019, owes £761,994.05 to HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC), a court was told on Monday.
At a short hearing at London's Rolls Building, Insolvency and Companies Court Judge Sebastian Prentis said Ms Price had not responded to HMRC over the debt, and declared her bankrupt.
He said: "There has been no response from the debtor. The papers are in order.
"There is a substantial debt due from Ms Price to HMRC, and therefore I will make a bankruptcy order."
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Judge Prentis said the bill "derives from self-assessments from the year 2020-2021 and from the year 2021-22" and includes income tax, VAT, surcharges and interest.
HMRC had issued a bankruptcy petition in October 2023.
Ms Price, 45, did not attend the hearing on Monday, which came days after she was fined £880 for driving without a licence or insurance in Northamptonshire in August last year.
In February this year, she was ordered by a different High Court judge to pay 40% of her income from adult entertainment website OnlyFans to trustees for the next three years in a separate dispute over unpaid debts, with the hearing told she was due to face questions about her finances in April.
In October last year, Ms Price said she was "fed up" with being threatened with legal action and would go to prison to be "done with it all".
Speaking to TV personality Michelle Visage on her Rule Breakers podcast, Ms Price discussed her bankruptcy and said she had recently been to court "more times than I've had hot dinners" and would "genuinely" not care if she was jailed.
Ms Price has even insisted it could be a 'win-win situation' for her, as she plots to turn her potential prison stint into a TV opportunity by televising her experience afterwards.
In March 2023, Ms Price told Jeremy Vine's Channel 5 show that people should not be "ashamed" of being declared bankrupt and she had been struggling with her mental health in recent years.
During a hearing in October 2020, Ms Price apologised to the court, saying: "I just haven't been able to deal with these issues or in the right mental state to understand everything that has been going on."
Ms Price has been approached for comment following Monday's hearing.