THE former chairman of the Campbell Soup empire, John Dorrance, who took out Irish citizenship last year, is Ireland's richest person with a fortune of £840 million according to the latest Sunday Times guide to the super rich. The list of the Irish rich includes most of the expected names - O'Reilly, Dunne, Naughton, Quinn and U2.
Notable absentees, however, include former business high fliers such as GPA chairman Tony Ryan and beef baron Larry Goodman. Both of these would have high in the listings of the Irish rich were it not for the recent difficulties at GPA and Goodman International.
Indeed a survey of the Irish rich carried out some years ago by Irish Business magazine listed Larry Goodman as Ireland's richest person. That, however, was before the collapse and subsequent rebirth of Mr Goodman's beef processing empire.
The Earl of Iveagh and the various members of the extended Guinness family are number two in the Irish list, with a fortune of £600 million. In joint second place with £600 million is the combined fortune of Independent Newspaper chairman Tony O'Reilly and his wife, shipping heiress Chryss Goulandris.
A combined fortune of £500 million puts the Dunne supermarket dynasty in fourth place, although the Times survey does not break this fortune down between Margaret Heffernan, Frank Dunne and their estranged brother Ben Dunne, who was deposed as chairman of the group.
Ben Dunne, however, is understood to have received in excess of £100 million in an out of court settlement for his share of the family business when he settled a High Court case he took against his siblings last year.
Glen Dimplex chairman Martin Naughton, Belfast engineering magnate Fred Wilson and the combined wealth of the Smurfit paper and packaging family all share joint fifth place with an estimated wealth of £150 million.
Cement czar Sean Quinn, whose other interests include pubs, hotels and insurance is in eighth place with an estimated fortune of £130 million.
Industrialists might dominate the ranks of the Irish super rich, but music has made the four members of rock group U2 and their manager into extremely wealthy people. Paul (Bono) Hewson, David (The Edge) Evans, Larry Mullen, Adam Clayton and U2 manager Paul McGuinness each have an estimated fortune of £73 million, says the Times.
The listing of the 500 richest people in Britain includes many with strong links with Ireland and Irish business. The Weston family, whose interests in Ireland range from the downmarket Crazy Prices to the very upmarket Brown Thomas, is the third richest in Britain with an estimated fortune of £2.2 billion.
Bahamas based financier Joe Lewis - a friend and golfing partner of Michael Smurfit and book maker J.P. McManus and also a key player in the Telecom Eireann/Johnston Mooney site affair - is among the British top 10 rich with a fortune of £1 billion.
Former supermarket king Albert Gubay, currently developing a marina and a chain of health clubs in Ireland, is worth £275 million while the owner of Lismore Castle in Waterford, the Duke of Devonshire, is worth £375 million.
The richest person in Britain with a fortune of almost £2.9 billion is Tetra Pak founder Hans Rausing, followed by David Sainsbury and the rest of the supermarket family who are worth £2.5 billion.
Queen Elizabeth is 26th in the list with a fortune of £450 million - although the compliers of the survey warn that her real wealth might be as high as £10 billion if the royal art collection - currently held by a charitable trust is taken into account.
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