The boss of a popular London brewery cheated the taxman of a “very significant sum” by failing to pay nearly £730,000, a court was told.

Jules Whiteway-Wilkinson, 43, the founder of London Fields Brewery in Hackney, was said to have run an outwardly thriving business but had been “less successful when it came to paying tax”.

He appeared at Wood Green crown court charged with deliberately failing to pay HM Revenue and Customs VAT, PAYE and national insurance and student loan contributions gathered by his business over a three-year period.

He denies the charges, which he is facing jointly with his wife Rosemary Spence.

Prosecutor Timothy Godfrey said that although the brewery, whose beers include Hackney Hopster and Shoreditch Triangle, had appeared to be prospering, Whiteway- Wilkinson and his wife had cheated HMRC of a “very significant sum” by failing to pass on taxes they had collected on its behalf.

“The brewery was ostensibly successful, but they were less successful when it came to paying tax,” Mr Godfrey told the court.

“They failed to submit tax returns for their business or pay tax over a three-year period — 2012, 2013 and 2014. They cheated the Revenue of taxes which totalled £727,203.”

Mr Godfrey said that beer duties and corporation tax also “went unpaid” and that although these failures were not included in the charges they were “very much part of the picture” of how the brewery had been run.

The court heard that London Fields was set up in 2011 in the names of Rosemary Spence and Ian Burgess, the owner of the fashionable Climpson and Sons coffee shop in Hackney.

Mr Burgess ended his involvement within months, however, after he and Whiteway-Wilkinson, who had helped him run the brewery from the start, “fell out”.

Whiteway-Wilkinson was then registered as a joint partner in the business with his wife. The case continues.