Russian businessman Alisher Usmanov has topped the Sunday
Times ranking of the wealthiest people in Britain and Ireland with a fortune of
£13.3bn.
The Surrey-based tycoon, 59, who has a 30% stake in
Arsenal football club, owns iron ore producer Metalloinvest.
Warner Music's Len Blavatnik comes next in the 25th
annual list with £11bn but steel magnate Lakshmi Mittal's £10bn sees him drop
from first to fourth.
The 1,000 richest people in Britain and Ireland share a
wealth of £450bn.
The highest British-born person in the list is the Duke
of Westminster in eighth place with £7.8bn from property. He is the only person
to make the top 10 of the list in each of its 25 years.
Other Britons include Sir Philip and Lady Green, who are
16th in the list with £3.8bn from their retailing empire, and Sir Richard
Branson, founder of the Virgin brand, in 19th place, with £3.5bn.
Former Miss UK Kirsty Bertarelli shares her £7.4bn
pharmaceuticals fortune with husband Ernesto, the same amount as last year, but
they have slipped three places down the list to ninth place.
In third place are Sri and Gopi Hinduja,
of the London-based global conglomerate Hinduja Group, with £10.6bn.
Chelsea FC's Russian owner Roman Abramovich, who made
his fortune in the oil industry, is down two places to fifth with £9.3bn.
There are a record 88 billionaires in the list -
compared to 77 last year and just nine when the rich list started in 1989, and
the Queen was placed top.
Her then wealth of £5.2bn included the Crown Estates
and the royal art collection but since 1993 the Queen has been valued only on
personal worth for the purposes of the list.
The combined wealth of the top 200 people in list is
£318.2bn which is more than eight times the figure 25 years ago.
Mr Usmanov started his business empire with the
manufacture of plastic bags.
His interests now include Russia's biggest iron ore
producer Metalloinvest, a stake in internet business mail.ru and a holding in
mobile phone operator MegaFon which became listed on both the London and Moscow
stock exchanges last year.
Mr Usmanov owns Sutton Place in Surrey, the former
home of the late oil baron J Paul Getty, as well as a £48m mansion in north London.
Mr Blavatnik saw the biggest rise in wealth among
those listed with an increase of £3.4bn over the past year.
The Russia-born media mogul, who now holds US
citizenship, sold his stake in Russian oil and gas giant TNK-BP for £2bn last
month.
India-born Mr Mittal, who topped the list for the
past eight years, was the biggest faller in wealth terms after his 40% stake
with his wife in steelmaker ArcelorMittal plunged from a peak of £28bn to just
under £6bn.
Earlier this month former Beatle Sir Paul McCartney
was revealed to have topped the Sunday Times Rich List of musicians with the
£680m fortune he shares with his wife Nancy Shevell.
Sir Paul, whose American heiress wife is said to be
worth £150m, has topped each music list since 1989 when he was worth an
estimated £80m.
Andrew Lloyd Webber was second with £620m and Irish
rock band U2 were third with £520m.
Courtesy: BBC
Courtesy: BBC
