The Sunday Times - UK (2022-05-29)

16 The Sunday Times May 29, 2022

MONEY

the total £223.8 million in

credit union income came

from loan interest, according

to the Bank of England.

Earlier this year, Robert

Kelly, the chief executive of

the Association of British

Credit Unions, told Money:

“The best way of describing it

is a bigger share of people’s

wallets will sit with credit

unions. We won’t replace

high street banks but we want

to be more competitive.”

Credit unions will soon be

able to offer car finance loans

and insurance products to

their members as part of the

biggest shake-up of the sector

in 43 years.

Treasury minister John

Glen said the government

would use the upcoming

Financial Services and

Markets Bill to amend the

1979 Credit Union Act. Unions

have long been popular for

their community ethos but

have struggled to grow, which

the sector has put down to a

lack of variety in what they

can offer.

The UK’s 395 credit unions

are almost entirely reliant on

one source of income:

interest on unsecured

personal loans made to

members. In 2020, the latest

year for which figures are

available, £183.9 million of

George Nixon

Contact us Money,

The Sunday Times,

1 London Bridge Street,

London SE1 9GF

Ta x re c eipt s

£800bn

0

200

400

600

2002-03 2006-07 2010-11 2014-15 2018-19

Source: HMRC

The amount of cash the

Treasury is raking in

from taxes and national

insurance rose to more

than £718 billion for the

2021-22 tax year, up

22 per cent on the

previous year.

Wages have risen

quickly, up 7 per cent in

the year to March 2022,

but tax thresholds have

only risen 0.5 per cent

since 2019 so more

people have been

dragged into higher tax

brackets.

CHART OF THE WEEK THE TAX TAKE

Need a car loan? Go to your credit union

A nudge to find the best pension advice

contribution pensions (where

what you have is dependent

on how much you pay in and

investment growth) from the

age of 55.

There are fears that people

are making the wrong

choices, such as buying a

poorly priced annuity (a fixed

yearly income typically for

the rest of your life), or taking

too much too soon and

running out of funds in

retirement.

your pension fund or transfer

between schemes with the

aim of accessing your pot.

You can opt out of the

guidance session so you do

not need to speak to someone

at Pension Wise to access or

transfer your pension. Or you

can book an appointment if

you are over the age of 50.

The reforms are intended

to help savers, who now have

total flexibility in how they

access any defined

Savers looking to access their

pension pots will be

“nudged” towards the

government’s guidance

service from this week.

New rules, which come

into effect on Wednesday,

require pension providers to

ask you if you want to book a

financial guidance session

with the free Pension Wise

service if you ask to access

Imogen Tew

The rise in the energy price

cap from its introduction in

January 2019 to its expected

level in October 2022

146%

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or call him on 07917 598422

Matt Goss, right, in

London this year, and

above, with his identical

twin brother, Luke, as

part of late 1980s boy

band Bros

M

att Goss first found fame

in the 1980s as part of the

boy band Bros. Alongside

his twin brother, Luke,

and school friend Craig

Logan, Matt had eight UK

top ten hits, including a

No 1 with I Owe You

Nothing. The band won

the best new artist Brit

award in 1989 and their debut album,

Push, went platinum several times over.

Since Bros split in 1992, Matt has made

his mark in America, with Las Vegas

residencies at the Palms, Caesars Palace

and the Mirage. This year he released his

fifth solo album, The Beautiful Unknown.

How much money is in your wallet?

I usually keep a grand in my money clip.

Cash gives me a sense of security. I think

it goes back to where I’m from. To me,

pocket money means literally that. I

stash money in the pockets of 20 or 30

suits, so when there are big birthdays,

I’ll use it to buy amazing gifts.

Are you a saver or a spender?

Financial advisers say: “Save, save,

save!” I agree with that 90 per cent, but

you’ve got to be a bit reckless from time

to time and have certain toys you want.

Everybody deserves to treat themselves.

Do you own a property?

Yes, a property in the UK that my

stepfather, Tony, lives in. He loved

my mum, and I promised her I’d take

care of him, so that will be his until he

leaves this earth.

I also own a property in America that

The ex-Bros star tells Samantha Rea about his seven-bedroom

healing house, why watches are better than shares and the

£70,000 sapphire that was stolen before he could sell it

seven-figure deal with a record company

in America. I created an album and it

ended up doing very well.

What’s your most lucrative work?

When I was in Bros, we did a TV

commercial in Japan, for a well-known

Japanese brand and I got £2.5 million for

three days’ work.

Do you invest in shares?

I have an investment portfolio and I like

to be fairly aggressive. I wish I’d invested

in Amazon a lot sooner. I also invest in

watches — they’ve outgunned my stocks

for the past couple of years. You can

make a tremendous return on fine

watches in the secondary market. You

can get maybe five times what you paid

for them, and they’re something you

can enjoy too. I’ve loved them since I

was a kid. I’ve got 11 at the moment, all

six-figure watches.

What’s your best investment?

My friendships, and working through

differences. I believe in loyalty and

investing in people because over the

years you create a force field

around you of people who want

to see you do well.

What’s your worst

investment?

When my mum wasn’t well,

I was liquefying my assets

to try to get her into this

programme that would

enable her immune

system to try to fight

the cancer cells. I

had a sapphire worth

70 grand, maybe more,

that I gave to a jeweller

to sell. He was a

friend, so I trusted

him — and I never

saw that stone again.

He said his brother

stole it from his safe.

It meant I didn’t quite

get to the number I

needed to get mum into

this programme. That’s one

of the most hurtful things anyone’s

ever done to me.

What’s your money weakness?

I love to spoil the people I love. I’ve

bought a lot of watches for friends —

mainly for my brother, Luke. I bought

my mum the house she wanted and five

or six cars. She gave me so much; she

gave me life, love and reassurance. My

love for her runs so deep, and it gave me

such pleasure to spoil her. It saddens me

that when Mum passed, Tony let go of

everything she owned.

What’s the most important lesson

you’ve learnt about money?

Money tends to bring money — but

finding your way to money can be a

terrifying journey. A lot of people are

having a tough time and I’m very aware

of how hard it is. I know how that feels.

Matt Goss’s new album The Beautiful

Unknown is out now; mattgoss.co.uk

FAME AND FORTUNE MATT GOSS

have been having two boys who needed

everything at exactly the same time.

Our granddad lived in a tiny

maisonette in Camberley. That’s where

we gravitated when dad left. It was a fun

time. We were little rogues, but we were

loved by our family and we loved them.

We met Tony, our stepfather, when

we were about nine. He had an E-Type

Jag and we were like: “Yes! We’re rich!”

But he was just giving it large,

pretending it was his. He was a jack of all

trades with a Morris Minor, not the car

you wanted to turn up at school in.

Have you ever been hard up?

In the early 1990s, when I went to LA

after Bros, I was selling one, if not two,

watches a month to get by. The money

Bros generated was extraordinary. We

made hundreds of millions and we were

working our arses off. But we were very

young and poorly managed. We didn’t

understand net and gross and we had

the same accountant as our manager, so

the numbers could be whatever they

were. To this day, I still don’t know. We

paid off every debt we ever owed. In

hindsight, we should have gone

bankrupt. I wouldn’t be ashamed now.

My watches kept me alive. I had 30,

and they would now be worth ten times

what I sold them for. Thankfully, the

week I sold my last watch I signed a

I’ve lived in for six years. People call it

the healing house. It gives me a lot of

peace. It’s beautiful and homely.

It’s three floors and seven bedrooms,

with an outdoor swimming pool, a gym

area, a games room, a garden, a steam

room and a wine cellar. My bedroom is

twice as big as my living room and I have

a walk-in wardrobe, a second wardrobe,

and two separate areas to get ready.

The first property I bought was a

mansion apartment in Maida Vale for

£1.5 million in 1989. For a simple

southeast London boy it was an

astronomical purchase. I wish I still had

it. I sold it in 1993 or 1994 when I was

going to America, and I made about

50 per cent profit on it.

Are you better off than your parents?

My mother was a phenomenal

hairdresser — she trained with Vidal

Sassoon. My father was a detective in

the CID murder squad for 37 years. I’m

extremely proud of his career, but he

left us when we were four and a half and

we didn’t have much help.

The gas would run out, and at

one point we were living on sugar

sandwiches. I remember Mum crying in

a phone box, hunched over the phone to

my grandfather. Luke and I were outside

in the rain and we saw a £5 note on the

floor. We knocked on the phone box,

and held up this £5 note. We knew it

would change something. Mum hung up

on granddad, we ran home and laid the

£5 note across our boiler. When it dried,

it opened up and there were two £5

notes, and the next day was a better day.

It’s only now I realise how hard it must

‘Life was hard — and

then I earned £2.5m

in just three days’

You’ve got

to be

reckless

from time

to time

DAVE HOGAN/HULTON ARCHIVE/GETTY IMAGES

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