ANAS Sarwar’s household now benefits from a £57,000 a year dividend from his family firm – bringing the total to nearly £300,000 since he boasted of cutting financial ties.
Scottish Greens MSP Maggie Chapman said it was a "pretty bad look".
The Scottish Labour leader’s shares in United Wholesale Scotland (UWS) – the cash and carry business started by his father – were estimated to be worth up to £4.8 million in 2017.
He initially denied taking dividend income from the shares but then admitted he had amid media scrutiny during a leadership contest he eventually lost to MSP Richard Leonard. He then relinquished the shares and put them into a trust for his three children.
Sarwar’s campaign boasted at the time that it meant he would be “unable to access the assets or take any remuneration for his lifetime, demonstrating his unswerving commitment to public service”.
But newly published accounts show the Anas Sarwar household has still received at least £297,000 worth of share dividends from the family firm since then.
The UWS accounts since 2017 show that Sarwar's wife Furheen retained 100 “Class B shares”, which generated a £400 dividend every year until the end of 2022, which The Herald noted at the time.
But the latest accounts, which are made up to the end of 2023, now show the value has increased to £570.
This means that the dividend payment the household gets from UWS has been boosted from £40,000 to £57,000 a year, the Sunday National can reveal – which would fall within the 80th percentile of salaries in the UK according to government figures, meaning 80% of people earn less than that amount.
It’s also more than double what a minimum wage worker in Scotland earns, assuming a 40-hour week.
This £17,000 boost in annual unearned income comes as Sarwar has been under scrutiny for backing extensive cuts to welfare and disability benefits – which the UK Government’s own modelling suggests will push a further 250,000 people into poverty, including 50,000 children.
The impact assessment stated that the estimate does not include the impact of the £1 billion annual funding, by 2029/30, for measures supporting people into work “which we expect to mitigate the poverty impact”.
But social change charity the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) went even further, suggesting that the impact of the changes to the main disability benefit Personal Independence Payment (PIP) and Universal Credit (UC) was closer to pushing 400,000 people into relative poverty after housing costs.
“Anas Sarwar made a public show of relinquishing his shares, but he didn’t tell people that his household was going to continue profiting from them,” MSP Chapman (above) said.
“At a time when the UK Labour Government is imposing swinging social security cuts, with Anas Sarwar’s support, it’s a pretty bad look.”
She added: “Labour are going further than even the Tories did to plunge people into totally avoidable poverty.
"Having millionaires like Anas Sarwar backing these policies shows just where Labour’s priorities are – and that’s not with those struggling to survive.
“With every passing day, it is becoming clearer that this is a Labour Party that are working for the super rich, continuing with Tory austerity, and ignoring the plight of families and communities who are struggling every day.”
Scottish Labour didn't respond to a request for comment nor disputed the figures.
