The tax dodging director of an electrical contracting firm has been banned from running any company for four years.

Brett Anthony Flack, director of Flack Building Contractors Ltd, which operated out of Forest Way in Woodford Green, was disqualified after an investigation by the Insolvency Service.

The company, which provided services to housing associations and commercial clients went into liquidation in July 2011 owing more than £250,000 to creditors.

The majority of that amount, just over £220,000, was owed to Revenue and Customs in unpaid taxes dating back as far as 2009.

An investigation by the Insolvency Service found that Mr Flack had continued to trade after agreeing to declare the company insolvent in February 2011.

During that time he incurred further tax debts while paying himself £60,000 from the company’s coffers.

Commenting on the disqualification, Mark Bruce, a Chief Examiner at The Insolvency Service said: “Directors who seek an unfair advantage over their competitors by not paying tax are damaging commercial confidence and harming the UK’s reputation as a place to do business. They should not expect to get away with it.

“Other directors tempted to follow this path should remember that if they run a business in a way that is detrimental to either its customers or its creditors they lose the protection afforded by limited liability.

"The Insolvency Service will investigate them and seek to remove them from the business environment.”

A spokeswoman for the insolvency Service said: "This is not a criminal penalty, it is a civil penalty.

"If our investigators think there are grounds for a criminal investigation then we would refer the matter onwards.

"However, we would not comment on whether we have done that in this or any other case."