The First Tier Tribunal not only delivered a verdict on Rangers tax case, they also nailed the issue facing an SPL Commission on the non-registration of player earnings. Certain HMRC assessments were upheld and some declined, as we expected. The findings:
Some payments were taxable and liable to NIC
Some payments were loans to players and “remain recoverable and represent debts on their estates”
Non-registration of side-letters [with the SFA and SPL]was incompatible with both authorities’ policing and disciplinary powers
The appeal “reduced substantially” the tax demand but upheld that “that advances in favour of certain players are taxable and liable to NIC”. So HMRC can look to recover much of the EBT outgoing from recipients, whereas the tax and NIC elements will perish with the liquidated company.
I didn’t expect the FTT to report on the non-registration of side letters but they were categorical on this:
“Side-letters, of course, had not been registered with the football authorities, the SFA and SPL. The spirit of their rules was that the whole contract terms should be registered. Suspiciously, no evidence was led as to who decided that the benefits in terms of the side-letters should not be registered. Non-registration of side-letters was incompatible with both authorities’ policing and disciplinary powers. For example any fines imposed on players would customarily reflect the disclosed wage. Non- disclosure would thwart the authorities’ powers.”
The report is anonymised and no indication is given as to which elements of the demand were upheld, which were denied, or the quantum of the demand.
Orders are now open for the very first CQN Annual, get it here!
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James Forrest, P67 and others.
I would love to believe that right will be out and that the whole of the community, including the football community know that they have been cheated by a club and a team that was immoral in its use of £45M of monies to line the pockets of those who could influence the game.
What’s to doubt about the place its full of corrupt and intransparent organisations, the list is inexhaustible and the lack of humility and apology is sickening. This is 2012 but feels like the 17th century.
Trying to get back on track for the footie.
Enjoy the gemme
Corkceltic…. Hope to God u are right mate, hail hail c’mon the hoops lets make history… Wembley beckons
HH all,
Sitting here in northern Holland waiting for the game to start. Can’t stop laughing – can it really be true they actually didn’t have to shut up shop after all? oh my oh my, where can i buy some jelly and ice cream! Even when they win they are still stupid (ex) Huns.
Come on Celtic add another glorious chapter to our 125 years of unbroken history.
YNWA
Aww naw is spot on its corrupt in this country, did anyone ever ask why loans from the 90’s has still not been paid back yet, total joke and I’m not holding my breath for titles to go now.
I thought the EBT is a Murray Holdings creation so don’t see how HMRC / BDO can make it call in the “loans”.
Those 2 judges were ” Swayed” by who knows what influence, noone in their rught mind can think those “loans” were anything but wages for foing a job.
So can we reclaim the Juninho tax now then?
He’ll mend the establishment and their rank closing. C’mon the celts!
Away to watch game.
Forget the orange monster zombie nation stitch up….
…..our day HAS come…….
Sky actually giving us max respect……
>>>>>
We should get a fund together for a statue of Craigy-boy….to rankers like the iceberg was to The Titanic….well done son, enjoy yer retirement in Monaco.
It’s all so laughable. Much mirth and merriment in the coming days and months as the implications of the masonic stitch-up become apparent.
It’ll need much brainier minds than mine to explain the caniptions and boondoggling that must have gone into producing this incomprehensible ftt result. To me it seems like a blueprint for tax avoidance; but what do I know? I just love Celtic and despise the zombies. Too simple I suppose.
>>>>
Big Victor Mugabe Wanyama getting the star treatment.
>>>>>
Loving it tonight. Still cresting on the wave from the Barça game @ Celtic Park.
What dreams may come yet.
Our ‘A’ team on show. On paper, stronger than the team that beat the Catalan giants.
Much to look forward to.
HH!
Sorry, but my thoughts are straying……will Uncle Chunkles now start going on the demand for reinstatement to the spl, on the basis that admin/liquidising was all a mistake? Nothing would surprise me any more in this establishment managed omnishambles. Corrupt, fraudulent and conspiratorial are not sufficient words to describe this orange fantasy. Surreal. Kafkaesque (lovely word!).
: > )
Souness on al jazeera ,showing Lisbon game”may i remind you English,they were the 1st British team to won the European Cup, managed by the great Jock Stein….”
Woohoo, Europa League at worst, well done to Lenny and his Lions.
First time poster but long term lurker. Seems to me that this is bad for HMRC but potentially good for us. The ruling seems to say that the Huns are ok re tax (in some cases).
My understanding is that the old club paid money into the EBT which then lent!!!! the money to the various recipients (like they were all a bit short of cash) This ruling now says that these monies were emoluments (ie income in the form of loans which need to be repaid)
The questions for me are ;
1. Is there a repayment schedule ?
2. If not, can BDO force the issue and insist that the loans are repaid for the benefit of oldco creditors. If so, lets stand back and watch the fun!!!! Picture it -“this wasn’t what I signed up to and here’s the side letter to prove it”
Let the fun begin……..
Today’s EBT verdict is not an admonishment
There is 111 EBT’s 34 of them liable for tax
If these figures are accurate then we have these percentages
Oldco were 30.6% guilty and 69.4 not guilty
Nearly a 3rd is a big part of nearly 100 mil
Add that to the Craigy Boy Whyte bill and you have a loss to the taxpayer of approx 50 mil
There is much for Minty and co still to be worried about especially a 50 mil debt they can’t bury from the public
We have a real tangible figure now and it’s a big loss so any celebrations in sevcoland are quite premature
we should let them know it csc
Mon Celtic make you make us all so proud
I see CQN is infested by huns tonight.
Squirt squirt ….
Listen to this ya stupid huns:
1. You’re club died and could have been saved if you’re leaders didn’t crap it and do a runner.
2. You are now officially the most stupid people on the planet.
3. This is only half time.
:))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))
Books
Zombies for nothing
Come on you Celts!!!!!! :)))))
Book
Unlucky Celtic.
Better side won but we had one or two good chances.
Wilson MOTM and Forster a close second.
Not a great day but, whatever happens in the last game, we have European football after Xmas. How many of us would have taken that when we saw the group…
http://www.thefootballlife.co.uk/post/36166492493/the-phyrric-victory
On the BTC verdict.
It’s kind of grotesquely beautiful, really
Corporate criminality and the Rangers tax case
Tax avoidance or tax evasion whether carried out by oldco Rangers, football clubs in general, Vodafone, GAP, high street banks or any major corporate entity is morally wrong. Any individual, group, board or corporate organisation that seeks to deny the Treasury access to monies that could be put to good effect in alleviating endemic poverty, funding children’s education and improving the NHS should be openly denounced and vigorously challenged.
There has been a lot of semi-pious hot air expelled in the debate that has evolved since the law lords ruled that the funding and operation of an Employees’ Remuneration Trust established by the Murray Group for Rangers players and their families was not subject to income tax.
This week’s legal finding has major implications for the current Scottish Premier league investigation into alleged dual contractual arrangements at Ibrox. The basis of the SPL inquiry is that governance rules state that all payments made to players in respect of their earnings from football must be declared by their club.
The SPL has convened an “independent” panel to consider evidence compiled by lawyers Harper MacLeod (who have a well established financial relationship with Celtic FC) about Rangers players contractual arrangements. Much of this evidence is apparently based on internal Ranger’s memos and communications relating to the operation of the remuneration trusts. However the terms of reference of the inquiry are based on suppositions that have now been broken into legal and bureaucratic smithereens.
This week’s legal ruling points out that while internal oldco Rangers documents – typically composed by lay persons without specialist legal experience – may be suggestive of “aggressive” tax avoidance, in legal terms they cannot “on any view override the legal effect and tenor” of the existing EBTs. In legal terms, there was no payment of player emoluments or earnings arrangements involving the EBT. Put simply, it appears that Rangers now have no case to answer in relation to alleged dual contracts of employment.
The legal context in which the league chose to undertake their inquiry has now changed to such an extent that SPL’s chief executive and board should act speedily by calling a halt to proceedings. All competent company executives and administrators need to act in response to newly established facts and not leave their organisation pursuing wasteful, pointless and potentially costly disciplinary pursuits. Such action is critical if the SPL executive wish to avoid bringing the organisation into disrepute by further undermining public confidence in it as an efficient and effective overseer of Scotland’s top football clubs affairs.
Conflict of interest?
Many Rangers supporters had already expressed severe misgivings in the way in which the SPL had chosen to constitute the investigation. Accusations of a conflict of interest have filled radio talk shows, web forums, pubs and football terraces in the West of Scotland and beyond. Rangers fans argue that the decision to appoint a legal firm that has a financial relationship with Celtic FC as evidence gatherers and investigators into their clubs internal affairs fundamentally undermines public perceptions of the impartiality of the process. They point out that Celtic FC stand to potentially directly benefit from the decisions of the panel by being awarded Premier league titles that could be stripped from Rangers. It is argued that the SPL have contrived to create situation, which if acted out in reverse would be hotly contested by the Parkhead faithful.
To illustrate what they see as hypocritical arguments, one Rangers supporter painted the following hypothetical example to me: a Celtic PLC shareholder puts forward an AGM motion calling for Rangers lawyers to investigate historical allegations of ‘financial doping’ (e.g. based on under reporting of crowd figures and related un-taxed gate receipts by previous Celtic regimes). Potential disciplinary consequences could amount to rewriting of the historical record by stripping Celtic of related league titles to subsequently to be awarded to Rangers. Such arrangements would in his view cause most Celtic shareholders and fans confidence in the independence and impartiality of the proceedings to be undermined. He suggests that the proposed motion would be heavily defeated. He contends that any arguments from Rangers fans that the final disciplinary decision based on the gathered evidence would be arrived at by an “independent” three man tribunal set-up by the SPL would likely fall on deaf ears.
Real issue
While such ill-informed gaseous hypocrisy continues to fuel the debate between Glasgow divided fans the basis for focussing the collective power of Scotland’s working classes remains undermined. The attention of all football fans would be better drawn to the systematic but somehow legally enshrined corporate criminality of hundreds of the UK’s biggest companies. During this historic period of austerity, thinking football fans could be channelling their vitriol at the incompetent and compromised political representatives who have failed to close tax loopholes leaving British taxpayers to plug a multibillion-pound hole in the public finances. If one positive emerges this unprecedented Scottish football debacle, let it be an end to the corporate employment of increasingly complex and secretive tax arrangements which limit the amount Britain’s tyrannical business barons hand over to the people’s exchequer.