Walter Smith was not named by BBC’s Mark Daly as a recipient of an Employee Benefit Trust in the recent documentary, however, before this matter is put to bed I expect more names to emerge. As soon as Smith makes himself available to a proper journalist he will be asked:
Did he receive EBT loan payments from Rangers?
If so:
Did he repay those loans or hold his cash while the club ran out of money and died?
Was he in receipt of a letter from Rangers confirming he was not required to repay?
Did his then employers, the Scottish FA, know he was perhaps receiving money from a member club while employed by them?
Are SFA employees contractually inhibited from taking payments from a member club or required to inform the SFA board of any payments received by a member club?
Did his earlier employers, Everton FC, know if he was receiving money from another club while employed by them?
Was Smith contractually inhibited from taking payments from another club or required to inform Everton of any payments received from another club?
As manager of Rangers, was he involved in negotiations with players who had EBTs or was he another one who concentrated on administrative and legislative duties?
Was he one of the men SFA president, Campbell Ogilvie, suggested failed to reveal side contracts to the Rangers board?
Rangers’ liquidators, BDO, will forensically pour over most of these questions, so Smith’s answers will be verifiable.
No one who played an active part in Rangers EBT scandal will come out of this clean. The ramifications multiply if Rangers were discretely paying any senior employee of another club.
I simply cannot imagine the justification for a member club discretely paying a senior employee of the SFA. Frankly, it would be beyond every Celtic fan’s most paranoid fantasies. I am sure Mr Smith will quickly and easily be able to reassure everyone.
An interesting twist in Smith’s bid for the assets of Rangers is that if he is to inherit Green’s application for a SFA licence and take a controlling interest in the club, Green is obliged to do due diligence on Smith to determine if he is a Fit and Proper person. Perhaps Mr Green can use the above as his due diligence questionnaire.
One final thought. In the unlikely event that it is established that one senior SFA employee was receiving discrete payments from Rangers, we need an immediate and independent inquiry to establish how many others received such payments and what they were for.
As a matter of some urgency I would recommend Stewart Regan brings himself up to speed on this one. I am sure his president is banging the table as you read this insisting the chief executive gets to the bottom of this. It’s not as though he is heavily conflicted and the SFA is in dire need of an independent president to steady the ship.
My friends in Celtic, this just got interesting.
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Hillhouse is upper Hamilton
Lanterns, static torches, garden ‘flares’ and a damp ‘bonny’ – ready.
game off due to weather
Play suspended in Ukraine due to lightning
Text message from Mrs Bourne expressing disdain because Celtic have lifted £250 from our bank account.
She knows what New Club means, and how I view there place in Div 3.
Sky and their TV deal – if they want Glasgow derby games promote Glasgow Cup to full teams again home & away to give him atleast two Celtic-theRangers matches
Also great opportunity for SPL to get rid of that awful split. Have league of 11 teams – 40 matches playing each other an even number of times 2 h&a. Guarenteeing all clubs two Celtic visits plus one additional home match which will go along way to compensating them for any loss of income.
—
A&E on standby then, not the easiest things to light – be careful out there or it may well be “chinese burns”!
Is larkhall planning a blackout counter protest?
Good grief look at that rain. Wasn’t there talk of playing all games under cover? Do they all have roofs?
@James Forrest
Excellent post.
So no SPL vote on newco till July, but the fixtures to be published on Monday? Is that right?!
BSR
Mrs BT annoyed that I am bladdered again…
…a test ‘firing’ may be in order…….
malceye on 15 June, 2012 at 17:04 said:
James Forrest
I simply cannot believe how easily Green and co have been able to pull the wool over so many eyes. The facts are so very clear. Liquidation means termination. For example, if Parks of Hamilton went into administration and I bought their fleet of buses and then subsequently Parks were liquidated, all I have is a fleet of buses. Green has Ibrox and Murray Park but he does not have the former RFC.
—–
Or the players.
Great deal Mr Green. :D
HH
/Bishop B
Kevtic
I am due to visit my friends in Larkhall tomorrow evening..
guess what, they are not all orcs in Larkhall
Moonbeams WD. Kano 1000 \o/ Supporting Neil Lennon 100%. Champions. on 15 June, 2012 at 16:45 said:
Canny get a ruddy lantern anywhere!!!
Grrrrrrrrr
MWD
——————————————————————————-
Semichem Paisley.
i can go buy them now, and meet you hald way ?
if you want them
So, in summary, Charles Green wants his newco to be known as Rangers, to play in blue shirts at Ibrox, to have the history of Rangers oldco and to take the place of Rangers oldco in the SPL. At the same time he DOESN’T want newco to be held accountable for the multitudinous sins of oldco – no responsibility for EBT cheating, double contracts, fleecing of creditors, etc.
This guy has got some brass neck on him, I’ll give him that.
Cynical as I am about the hun media and the motives of SPL chairmen, I just cannot believe that he could ever pull that off. The game in this country would be completely finished otherwise.
Wind abating over Erskine. We are back on launch mode. -4 hours 48 mins
Must admit to dreading lighting one of these things on my own,having got bored halfway through reading the instructions I’m hoping its a simple enough process……..
Getting struck by lightning is ‘like a new signing’ -Mark Hately.
JohnnyClash on 15 June, 2012 at 09:24 said:
Smith will not be asked these questions. I don’t recall him being asked a single awkward question by a Scottish sports hack since the time he threatened Chic in the tunnel at Ibrox.
Smith’s group will take over Rangers, as soon as they come up with a bid that gives Green & Co a sufficient return. Fan pressure and season ticket sales will ensure that this is the case.
I would expect the BDO investigation to concentrate on Murray, Whyte and possibly other directors rather than the recipients of EBTs. The question is – do the SFA have the appetite to investigate payments from Rangers to individuals at other clubs or within their own organisation? I sincerely doubt it.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++
It will take BDO acting for HMRC to check out Walter Smith’s part in Rangers downfall and they will have every reason to do so.
When the PLG “project” went belly up two men decided on the way ahead, Sir David Murray and Walter Smith (funny how his knighthood never turned up intit?).
Smith was not even at Rangers but was working with the SFA. (did they ever get compensated btw?). Anyhoo WS and SDM got together and started to build a team to end Celtics title domination and divert the CL income that came with it to Rangers.
So in 2007 after Smith arrived Smith identified £11.3m of players that SDM agreed should be bought to start the rebuild.
In 2008, by which time the core big tax bill had arrived (Feb 2008 I’ve read) WS identified a further £18m of players, two of whom are on the ebt list (Mendez and Davis – so WS knew all about ebts). That makes £29.3m that WS was responsible for Rangers spending in order to win. (a habit WS could not break when he managed to get approval for a £4m spend on Jelavic in spite of Lloyds control, although the full price was never going to be paid as things turned out).
To be fair transfers out in 2008 of £19.5m brought net spend (not including wages) down to £9.8m but had that £19.8m been set aside for HMRC in 2008 and had only half of the £18m been spent Rangers could easily have covered the big tax bill before interest and fines.
This WILL come out in the HMRC wash and WS stands as guilty as SDM in Rangers fate. All the above figures are in the public domain and all it needs is a jouno with gonads to bring it out. It will not be Chico but what a chance for him to get his own back on a bully.
Blantyre is lower Hamilton.
Ukraine getting the hun’s demise party started early with spectacular electrical storm. They obviously ran out of lanterns. Burley doing what Burley does best, spewing sh*te!
All you prospective Chinese Lanterners. As far as I am aware it is illegal to use them within ten miles of an airport.
B/tim- certainly not the McStays.
And hoopslegend John Clark played for Larkhall Thistle.
RC TYRE…
Hi hoops
Haven’t had a chance to catch up much but
Succulent minted lamb burgers – check
Chilled cava and cask strength mortlach to follow- check
Raspberry jelly-check
Ice cream-check
Chinese lanterns-check
We’re having a party
HH
SIALF
DBBIA
so did my big Bro… 0))
Bloody wimps. I’ve played in worse weather than that.
Here’s a question.
It this rain and lightning happened during the final group game in any given group, would they have to simultaneously suspend both games?
BT
Sober up mhan :-)))
HT
shut it ya dobber….. o))
‘It is illegal to launch a sky lantern in most parts of Germany, and in the remaining areas where use is technically legal, such as Herford, it is still necessary to obtain advance permission from local authorities. In Austria, it is illegal to produce, sell, or import them, or to distribute them in any other way.In Brazil, it is illegal to launch lanterns in the whole territory’
BT
Hit her with your New Club jokes.
quonno on 15 June, 2012 at 17:14 said
Thank you. I am not in UK but close to an airport and was worried about that.
In any case, I couldn’t find any, so have bought floating candles and will float them on the Med at 10pm CPT.
*consults insurance documents for ‘self-immolation’ clause*
Sparkleghirl
Stadiums have roofs but the problems are temperatures as well.
Imagine roof closed, temperature between 26C and 32C and sixty thousands fans in.
Players who left the stadium after Poland against Greece in Warsaw said it was like a hell inside.
BT
*sitting in corner weeping and dejected*
Anybody remember Jason the Blue Peter dog?
BSR
I don’t do plagiarism..