Lump sum payment, no prior salary for years

Hi - An offshore company was paying employee (Director) under UK PAYE up to 2015 for project work overseas. Employee is a UK resident. The project stalled, and employee received no income for 8 years but continued to work for them. The company suspended PAYE and made no statutory payments as it had no funds. The project just sold and employee will receive a lump sum final payment of c. 65k. Company will close down immediately. Q: Can employee minimize tax by having a portion allocated to a redundancy payment, if available? Q: Can employee "allocate" the payment over any of the prior unpaid tax years Q : Can employee encourage the company to make up the missing statutory payments, pension etc Any other advice welcome. Thank you.

Hi

No. the redundancy payment is taxable in the year that it is paid.
However, he may be able to claim the first £30,000 tax free. 
You can find guidance here Redundancy payments helplines

Thank you