Ineos chairman plans to sue founding member MacLean - City A.M.

April 2 (Reuters) - Ineos Group Chairman Jim Ratcliffe plans to sue one of the Swiss chemical group's founding members, Calum MacLean, alleging he violated his departure terms by poaching a finance director, the City A.M. newspaper reported on Wednesday.

Ratcliffe accuses MacLean of poaching Steve Bennett after moving to Synthomer Plc, another chemical maker, the newspaper reported, citing a letter from Ratcliffe to Synthomer's chairman. (http://bit.ly/1IqsrLM)

Synthomer named Bennett its chief financial officer on Wednesday. Bennett is CFO at a joint venture between Ineos Group AG and PetroChina (HKSE: 0857-OL.HK - news) .

In the letter, which City A.M. said it had seen, Ratcliffe said hiring Bennett reflected "very badly" on Synthomer's reputation. The letter assumed that Synthomer's board did not know of the agreement with MacLean, the free newspaper said.

"Synthomer's board is entirely satisfied with the integrity of the process that led to Steve Bennett's appointment," a spokesman for Synthomer said, declining to comment further.

MacLean, as chairman of Ineos Grangemouth (UK), was a key figure in the resolution of a pension dispute between the company and its workforce at the Grangemouth refinery and petrochemical plant in Scotland in 2013. He moved to Synthomer as chief executive in January.

"Ineos can confirm that it has written to the chairman of Synthomer, but we do not comment on the content of such correspondence," Ineos said in an emailed statement.

Bennett is due to join Synthomer in July.

City A.M. said Ineos had consulted its lawyers at Slaughter and May. The law firm could not immediately be reached for comment. (Reporting by Esha Vaish in Bengaluru; Editing by Anupama Dwivedi)