A FORMER Iron Acton parish councillor and celebrated charity collector has narrowly avoided jail after pleading guilty to tax fraud.

Peter Huish, who was once commended by the United Nations for his Help for Heroes charity work, said he was ‘incredibly remorseful’ for fraudulently keeping more than £28,000 in VAT over two periods between October 2012 and December 2013.

Mr Huish, 54, of Iron Acton, had previously pleaded guilty to using the VAT registration number from his dissolved company Kleeze Consultants Ltd and sole trading entity Executive Officer Service Ltd on invoices for Yate-based LinuxIT of which he was chief executive officer and subsequently non-executive director.

At Bristol Crown Court on Wednesday (September 23), CPS prosecutor James Bromige said HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) wanted their money back.

“An invoice was raised on the first of every month for £8,400 inclusive of VAT,” he said. “The defendant would provide invoices using the Kleeze number.

“No VAT was accumulated or paid despite taking and charging VAT.”

He said the fraud had been committed over two quarters, from September 1, 2012 to February 1, 2013 and between August 1, 2013 and November 1, 2013 but HMRC had discovered discrepancies during a routine audit in March 2014 and Mr Huish was arrested.

Defending, Julia Farrant said Mr Huish, who the court heard has a previous conviction for false accounting funds of around £7,000 in 1998, had been experiencing extreme financial difficulty and personal problems during the two periods.

“He was having a very difficult time financially,” she said. “He lost a substantial amount of money he had put into Linux and the company was struggling.

“He faced an extremely difficult time with the breakdown of his marriage, which is now happily back on track, the tragic suicide of his mother-in-law who he was very close to and the total loss of his pension.

“He was psychologically not right.”

She said, despite nearly having his house repossessed, Mr Huish, who has raised thousands of pounds for Help for Heroes and the Royal British Legion by organising collections at Tesco in Yate and completing gruelling runs, had got his life back on track and now works for an IT company.

“He wants to put all this right and has taken steps in his personal life to do that,” said Ms Farrant.

Judge Graham Cottle said he was prepared to suspend an eight-month prison sentence for two years and ordered Mr Huish to complete 250 hours of unpaid community work. He set out a timetable to repay the money under the Proceeds of Crime Act and ordered Mr Huish pay £300 costs.

Mr Cottle said: “It seems there were various problems of one sort or another in your personal life. There are now resolved and your personal life is much more stable.

“I have taken into account you have involved yourself for some time in charity work and engaged with the community in a very positive way.

“But you have a previous conviction for false accounting so this is not the first time you have behaved dishonestly in this sort of way.”

Afterwards, Mr Huish, a church warden at St James the Less Church who once hosted the village fete at his family home, said he had been suicidal when he committed the offences.

He said: “This was a sad and sorry event in my life for which I am incredibly remorseful.”