A BANNED company director from Bude has been jailed after spending £300,000 of Covid support on family holidays, private school fees, and other personal spending.

Steven Brookes, of Victoria Road, Bude, used funds from six fraudulently obtained Bounce Back Loans to pay for a trip to Disneyland, a holiday rental in Tenerife, and an Audi with personalised number plates for his wife.

The 40-year-old also paid £7,000 in fees for his daughter to attend an independent day and boarding school in Devon.

To fund these purchases, Brookes used ‘Bounce Back Loans’ which were meant to provide economic benefit to his five businesses during the pandemic.

However, instead of using them as intended, Brookes treated the loans as a personal fund, spending sums at florists, lingerie retailers and on paint to decorate his rental property, with multiple transfers also being made into the joint expenses account he held with his wife.

Brookes applied for the loans in his wife’s name, without her knowledge, and opened company bank accounts in her name to receive the funds.

He also inflated or fabricated the turnover figures used to support the applications and made a second loan application for the same company when he was only entitled to one.

All of the applications were made while Brookes was disqualified as a company director, using his wife’s identity to conceal his involvement.

As a result, Brookes was jailed for three years and banned as a director for 10 years when he appeared at Southwark Crown Court on Thursday, June 18, with the judge describing his actions as ‘calculated and greedy’.

He had pleaded guilty to 11 charges of fraud and acting as a director while disqualified at the same court last November.

David Snasdell, chief investigator at the Insolvency Service, said: “Steven Brookes cynically hid behind his wife’s identity to steal £300,000 in Covid support funds.

“Bounce Back Loans were not a personal bank account for company directors to use on paying for holidays, school fees and other luxury items. Brookes broke almost every rule going. He submitted false turnover figures, secured two loans when companies were only allowed one, and criminally misused the funds.

“He did all this while ignoring a director ban which had been in place for a decade at the time of his fraudulent actions.

“The Insolvency Service has relentlessly pursued Covid fraudsters since the pandemic. We are equally determined to enforce director bans - and hold those who wilfully break them to account.”

Brookes made six Bounce Back Loan applications across five companies between May and October 2020. In each case, he made the application in his wife’s name without her knowledge, having been disqualified as a company director for 11 years in April 2010 following a conviction for stealing mobile phones.

In total, he stole £300,000 from the scheme, of which only £7,494 has been repaid.

The Insolvency Service is seeking to recover the fraudulently obtained funds under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002.