A gentleman that’s going round Turning the joint upside down

There’s a gentleman that’s going round
Turning the joint upside down
Stool Pigeon – ha-cha-cha-cha
He’s an old ex-con that’s been away
Now he’s back, no one’s safe

It’s quite likely that David Grier and Craig Whyte had many conversations they didn’t want replayed on BBC Reporting Scotland.  Their deal to acquire Rangers from Sir David Murray and Lloyds Banking Group would have required many scenarios to be considered, some of which would certainly be unpalatable.  So with this in mind, Grier may have been comfortable discussing strategy with Whyte when the latter recorded their conversation in May this year.  They had been in the proverbial trenches together before and at one time would have had a bond of trust.

What frankly beggars belief is that either party would consider this bond to be still in place a month after Duff and Phelps sued Craig Whyte’s company for £25m.  It’s even more surprising that Mr Grier and Mr Whyte were on such convivial terms – chatting liberally in a restaurant about such a serious matter – while they were supposed to be on opposite sides of a £25m legal action.

We now know that Rangers administration went miles off track soon after it started. Whyte, as we predicted back in October last year, hoped to present creditors and Scottish football with a fait accompli.  Duff and Phelps were to complete the task within days for a fixed fee of a fraction of what they eventually raised.

Instead Duff and Phelps fee increased by a factor of six, Whyte lost control of events and inherited a great deal of litigation, not to mention a police inquiry.  Duff and Phelps must now prepare to tell the truth to Lord Hodge next week.  There are millions of pounds at play here and anything short of the truth could land them in heaps of trouble.

Credit to Mark Daly and Reporting Scotland for landing the recording.  The BBC are taking a pounding this month but this was a stunning item for an evening news bulletin to present.

Craig Whyte, you will remember, threatened to sue Daly last year and managed to convince the hard of thinking that Daly, and the BBC, were victimising Rangers by dishing the dirt on Whyte.  Some still adhere to this belief, despite now realising their Messiah was just a naughty boy, it’s a cognitive dissonance thing.  Another lesson that football fans are fools for bombast.

After all the talk then they wired him
And he took a walk with his crooked friends
And they joked about the good old days
And he recorded it on a reel of tape
He caught the mug who did in the forgery
And the babe in charge of larceny

We have to wonder what liquidators BDO will make of Duff and Phelps actions when they take over next week.  Ha-cha-cha-cha.

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