Coronation Street star Beverley Callard’s company goes bust with £215k debt – despite six-figure I’m A Celeb fee
CORONATION Street legend Beverley Callard’s personal company has gone bust with £215,000 worth of debt owed to trade creditors and the taxman.
The firm, JMBJ Ltd, was set up with husband Jon McEwan to cash in on her stint on I’m A Celeb in November 2020, but sadly it’s not worked out for the soap favourite.
Despite being paid a reported £125,000 to appear on the reality show, she and her spouse took out bumper directors’ loans from the limited company, which is currently £114,124 overdrawn.
The soap was liquidated on 13 April owing £51,450 VAT to HMRC, £47,319 corporation tax and £2,784 to two trade creditors, both accountants.
This means JMBJ is being wound up owing a total of £215,677 and has no assets to realise.
It was placed in a creditor’s voluntary liquidation, which happens when the directors formally close an insolvent firm as it has no hope of recovery.
The 66-year-old has opened up several times about her past financial problems, which resulted in her being made bankrupt in May 2012 when she had to borrow money from friends just to buy food.
Bev, who played barmaid Liz McDonald on and off for 31 years, was forced to quit the Corrie cobbles for a second time in 2010 due to a crippling depression, but then got into money difficulty when her and Jon’s pub business went under.
She was also paying huge medical bills – racked up in 2009 when she was admitted to a psychiatric ward – and had the added pressure of caring for mum Mavis, who was in the final stages of Alzheimer’s disease.
“It has been hell keeping everything secret. Since the bankruptcy became public people think I’m a showbiz diva who frittered her cash away on expensive dinners and fancy clothes. That couldn’t be further from the truth,” she said in an interview at the time.
“I’ve worked non-stop since I was 16 and somehow it all seemed it had been for nothing.
“We’d come to the end of the road. We had no money. I felt embarrassed and exhausted.”
Beverley quit the soap for good three years ago a few months before going into the jungle and was the third celebrity to be voted off.