Here’s the problem: this is a can of worms. If contagion was limited to Sir David Murray and other Murray Group executives, there may be more “appetite” to analyse what went wrong and what to do about it.
Rangers were a rogue football team, operating a tax scheme out with the law, failing to disclose appropriate documentation to HMRC, the SPL and SFA. Legal responsibility for the club’s actions lies with all directors, not just the majority owner. They have collective responsibility to ensure business is conducted appropriately. David King, Paul Murray, Alistair Johnston and former SFA president Campbell Ogilvie, were all Rangers directors during the EBT and DOS years.
The SPFL (formerly SPL) are also implicated. They set terms of reference for what became the Lord Nimmo Smith Commission, then amended those terms to only include matters which were, at that time, regarded as legal, explicitly excluding matters already confirmed as illegal.
They then failed to present evidence to Nimmo Smith of the five matters Rangers admitted guilt on during the First Tier Tribunal process, preferring only to present matters that were in dispute, but (temporarily) found in Rangers favour.
Having done this, they instructed their lawyer not to ask for an opportunity to appeal if the pending HMRC appeal was upheld. Instead, closing the book on a procedural appeal.
The SFA executives side just along the corridor from their SPFL counterparts. Yesterday they issued a remarkable statement:
“Specifically, Senior Counsel was asked to anticipate whether a determination in favour of HMRC, as announced today, could imply that there had been a breach of the Scottish FA’s Disciplinary Rules as they applied at the time of the EBT payments.
The clear opinion of Senior Counsel is that there is a very limited chance of the Scottish FA succeeding in relation to any complaint regarding this matter”.
I refer you to SFA Disciplinary Rule 71, Article 94.1:
“No recognised football body, club, official, Team Official or other member of Team Staff, player, match official, or other person under the jurisdiction of the Scottish FA shall bring the game into disrepute.”
They are asking you to believe that Senior Counsel told them no Rangers official brought the game into disrepute as a consequence of this matter. A matter which has left over £100m debt and hundreds of creditors unpaid, saw 55 players incorrectly registered, and one of the largest clubs in the country liquidated – the consequences of which will be permanent, no matter your view on Newco/same club.
All for an issue which Rangers directors gave evidence in court that the EBT scheme was undertaken to allow them to sign players they would otherwise be unable to pay. Ensuring an illegal sporting advantage.
Possible SFA sanctions for this include fines of up to £1m and/or expulsion from the game.
Sorry, but this is not a tenable position. The game was massively brought into disrepute; to issue a statement claiming otherwise just adds the stench of cover up to an already dreadful state. And bringing the game into disrepute is just scratching the surface, without going into consequences of the club’s actions on competitions.
I question the scope and remit given to Counsel, which was clearly limited in order to make it possible to deliver this statement. Who issued that scope and why it blinded Counsel to the clear matter of disrepute is another question to answer.
Executives at Hampden will have scoured news coverage this morning in the hope that this this will blow over. Scottish newspaper, TV and radio coverage is irrelevant. Instead, they should be looking to establish a recovery position for our game. This is not finished.
Those implicated by the contagion – the “heavily conflicted” do not get to decide that no action is to be taken; Scotland is not yet a Banana Republic.
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https://stripthetitles.wordpress.com/2017/07/06/strip-the-titles/
The wind is starting to rise…
Embramike
I posted yesterday that defeat to the Luxembourg side allowed the Hampden chaps to escape answering some really dodgy questions by a whisker!
The problem with UEFA is that they start behind the times.
For example, in 2011 by the time they were notified that Rangers FC had been granted a UEFA a licence by the SFA, HMRC had already demanded money from the self-same club and had accused them of fraudulent behaviour.
It is one of the great Res 12 mysteries as to when the SFA were informed of this letter. It should have been disclosed to them promptly but no one will tell us that they have ever even seen it — though the SFA have said that they are aware of its content – though they don’t tell us when they became aware of the content.
Regan has said several times that after a Euro Licence is granted whatever happens next is all down to UEFA. Yet that is not what Mr Traverso of UEFA says in his, by now, famous letter.
Who is right? Well. I know who my money is on.
Shortbackandsides
Re your post about “Illegal” activity and the EBT’s, there are a couple of subtle things to mention.
I agree that the use of EBT’s are legal and that what the SC has ruled is that the use of those same EBT vehicles (Whether Dos or otherwise) was unlawful.
And we can debate the nuances of illegal and unlawful till the cows come home but it is safe to say the SDM was very quick to point out that the decision of the court did not say there was any criminal activity re the se of the EBT’s or the administration of the trusts or the funds.
However, consider this.
Each and every year, Rangers PLC had to submit PAYE and NIC returns and records as a matter of law. When submitting those returns, they deliberately made no mention of the sums paid to players and others by way of EBT payments.
As part of their duties to football, the same Rangers PLC were obliged to lodge all contractual documentation regarding player payments with the football authorities. It is an accepted fact that they deliberately did not lodge any side letters or EBT related correspondence for (a) fear of sanction from the footballing authorities and (b) to conceal the existence of the aforementioned side letters.
When HMRC asked if there were any such side letters, MIH officials, including SDM, denied the existence of any such side letters and continued to submit returns which did not declare any EBT payments.
Even the scheme’s originator, Paul Baxendale-Walker, is on record as saying that the existence of any side letters makes the whole EBT administration scheme unlawful and the payments liable to tax.
Rangers FC did not heed that advice, were lax in checking their procedures re the EBT scheme and were in clear possession of legal advice that they were bang to rights over the wee tax case liability.
Yet still, they persisted in claiming that the sums were not due right up until early 2011.
The footballing rules requires them to declare any material change to their financial or business circumstances from those details provided when they applied for any UEFA licence or indeed a domestic licence as far as I am aware.
They continually made no such declaration and continued to represent a wholly false situation to the football authorities and all the representatives of every other football club in Scotland who were bound by the same rules.
It took the City of London Police entering Ibrox under warrant to uncover some of the side letters which Rangers said did not exist, and so start the ball really rolling on this whole sorry sage.
And so, it against this background, those actions and these regulations and matters of conduct that led HMRC to write to the company secretary of Rangers PLC and allege that the conduct of the club over a prolonged period of time was both deliberate and fraudulent.
It is not the operation of EBT’s in principle or in practice that is illegal, though the operation may well be unlawful. It is the operation of a deliberate course of conduct in dealing with the football authorities and the submission of knowingly false PAYE and NIC returns that amounts to illegal and possibly criminal conduct.
No football authority or judge has ever considered any of that and how it should impact on the bona fides, legality and conduct of the football club and its conduct in Scotland.
“What is surprising is just how much ammunition the Supreme Court has given HMRC (in Rangers tax case) in pursuing other EBT cases,” said Paul Noble, Head of Tax Investigations at law firm Pinsent Masons.”
“In recent years there have a number of high profile football tax cases including the Rangers EBT case being heard at the Supreme Court which continues to have serious implications for other clubs with similar arrangements.”
Mazars (Accountancy)
“Other business, including other football clubs, which used the same or a similar scheme will now receive (Follow) Follower notices from HMRC requiring them to pay the tax due based on this decision.” says David Richardson, director general of HMRC’s Customer Compliance group, after Rangers FC Supreme Court case
“It [has] long been the concern of many as to how one is able to properly understand and control the flow of funds in the game [of football]”, said Trevor Watkins, global head of sport at Pinsent Masons and former chairman of AFC Bournemouth said
“The Revenue gains a powerful tool this year – the new offence for the failure to prevent the facilitation of tax evasion – and it is already stepping up activity in preparation. Activity will be ramped up even further once it is actually operational.”
The new offence is just one of the new powers included in the Criminal Finances Bill, which the Government introduced in October.”
Economia Magazine April 2017
With the HMRC Football Compliance Unit in full swing and the brazen behaviour of Rangers Football Club, the dreadful administration of Scottish football. Hector now has a landmark judgement in his back pocket. HMRC are now issuing issuing (Follow) Followers Notices.
The shameful institutional cheating in Scotland, the sloppy arrogance of entitlement and lazy maladministration provided the precedent that the Exchequer were after.
The cause célèbre of the Rangers Tax Case(s) and the absolute incompetence and bias of the administrators is about to prove the wisdom of the adage ‘no-one likes us.’ They have handed HMRC the judgement they were after.
Looking through the webpages of accountancy firms touting for business and financial pages the name Rangers Football Club is now synonymous with financial doping and cheating.
David Murray, Souness, King, Ogilvie and the other conspirators are guilty. They are persona non grata. Their sporting achievements at Ibrox are worthless and should be erased from the record to vindicate honest footballers and supporters throughout Scotland.
Rangers cheated us all, every club, every supporter.
Hot on the heals after the landmark judgement the SFA very rapidly (panic) ‘examined the judgment’ – the Board immediately confirmed by Press Release there is no further action required…
“…Accordingly, having had time to consider the opinion from Senior Counsel, and having examined the judgment of the UK Supreme Court, the Board has determined that no further disciplinary action should be taken by the Scottish FA at this time.”
On the 19th of May 2015 the same incompetents (SFA) stated South Africa based Criminal, Dave King was a ‘fit and proper person.’
“The Scottish FA can confirm it has now received this supplementary documentation in full and the Board is satisfied Mr King is Fit and Proper in terms of Article 10.2.”
It looks like the SFA’s statements might come back to haunt them. This HMRC business isn’t going away.
Not only are the SFA not fit for purpose they have turned the administration of the Scottish game into a farce.
The unattributed SFA statement yesterday was perhaps the most arrogant, short sighted, management I have witnessed.
Given the ongoing antics of Sevco and the incompetence of the SFA, will anyone stand up and save the game?
Or will HMRC have to come knocking again?
http://www.scottishfa.co.uk/scottish_fa_news.cfm?page=1961&newsCategoryID=3&newsID=14785
…….Can we express our ambitions positively…….
Stand Up For Fairness…….?
I want them titles adressed appropriately, the way the Olympics go about it when cheating or doping has been established suits me fine……
Lets think smart and move the emotions of the greater number among us with a positive expression for our, reasonable and worthy cause.
blantyretim is praying for the Knox family on 6th July 2017 7:02 pm
Joe o Rourke has received a reply and Regan ain’t for moving….
Scum
===================
Celtic should have Regan by the sort and curlies on Res12.
He must have something on Celtic to be so brave but not on the CSA.
I see trouble ahead.
anyone know anyone in Hamburg?
Apparently, Trump’s people delayed in booking a hotel for the upcoming G20 meeting in Hamburg, and apparently all hotels are now booked solid …
anyone know anyone that might have a spare couch that Trump could kip on?
:)
amazing headtheball
must have been some sight and smell !!!!!
looks like Raonic is in tough today … may be a good thing that no one took up my Murray/Raonic wager!
:)
Like Winning Captains I have also been present at hampden for Doncaster’s ramblings…the man comes across as super-arrogant and stubborn. Regan on the other hand, is more of a bumbling figure who could be manipulated by someone like King…(especially if he has something on him, possibly via charlotte fakes)…just a personal opinion…
Time for these two charlatans to be removed…
Auldheid
For Regan to have something over Celtic that is stopping the club from bringing the house of cards down, it must be pretty bad.
It’s not like football in scotland will stop, clearing out the corrupt cheating scum should be a priority, unless……
What price integrity and honesty
HH
Oh, and btw…PR man Broadfoot was around at the time watching out for Regan…nasty piece of work that guy…
!!Bada Bing!! on 6th July 2017 5:27 pm
It’s at times like this, i find surprising that fans groups don’t have an organised body? Would help with things like ticket prices, and cheating hun bassas….
================
That why I’ve been promoting the Scottish Football Supporters Association. They might not be perfect but they have a manifesto in which good governance is significant.
http://scottishfsa.org/
Re Doncaster & Regan
These guys will obfuscate, shift, twitch, deflect and keep everyone at bay unless they are asked really pinpoint and awkward questions.
Those questions do exist and have never been asked.
HTB – he got bussed in from carrickfergus
Right, until titles are stripped / asterisked I am:-
– Boycotting Sky. Oh, I already cancelled my subscription last year
– Boycotting Ibox. Oh, I’ve been doing that since we played Raith Rovers in the Cup Final in 1994
– Boycotting the SFA. Oh, I’ve been doing that since the LNS commission decision
Crikey. Help me. What should I add to my list?
.
Not sure about Title Stripping..Asterix Etc..
But Shirley..?
They don’t Owe Tax on FLO..
Shirley..?
Hiv they No Suffered enough..?
Shirley..?
001ftTAFcsc
Dear Joe,
Thanks for you email. Having conducted a comprehensive legal review of the circumstances surrounding the matter to which you refer, our Board are content with the decisions we have made.
Your comments are noted.
Regards
Stewart Regan
Chairman: Rod Petrie (Scottish FA)
Members: Alan McRae (Scottish FA), Stewart Regan (Scottish FA), Andrew McKinlay (Scottish FA)*, Neil Doncaster (SPFL), Ralph Topping (SPFL), Duncan Fraser (SPFL), Michael Mulraney (SPFL), Stewart Robertson (SPFL), Sandy Stables (SHFL) and Andrew Waddell (SLFL)
The SFA will ignore the the Big Tax Case because at the time there was no reason to believe that Rangers (dead) were deceiving them. They cannot remove titles from clubs, that is up to the appropriate league. The SPL was wonderfully replaced by the SPFL soon after the demise of Rangers(dead) and after the CORRUPT admission of a club called SEVCO then quickly ‘Rangers’. SPFL will claim no ability to remove titles previous to their short remit.
Catching Up…
A STOR MHA CHROI @ 9:25 AM?
Seen your update…thx, Aberdeen were on the second tranche of Clubs voting against parachuting Sevco Scotland into the SPL. Still, think their participation was crucial. Think the Potential Season Ticket Boycott was crucial:)
STARRY PLOUGH @ 9:34 AM,
Yes! And the structure doesn’t help… the same people making the Commercial Decisions are making the Disciplinary Decisions… this has become a huge conflict of interests.
Add that to the culture problem you point out and Rangers’ Special Status and the whole thing becomes quite iniquitous.
Hail Hail
Shell game deception. Hidden in plain sight?
In terms of some planned action would this one fly? It inconveniences no one, can have a big visual impact and can keep going until it gets a result.
Starting with the first competitive SPFL Premier game and especially if televised,on the 14th minute there is a minutes silence.
The silence is in respect of the death of the integrity of Scottish football. Phone lights can go on to catch camera attention but as far as possible silence. Tip off TV companies of the reason so that they can report it. Tell them it will feature every week until some form into the governance of Scottish football is undertaken.
Repeat every Saturday or mid week televised Premier Game until the shame embarrasses those watching (and I mean more than SFA/SPFL, I mean other authorities who will want to protect Scotland’s reputation) into carrying out a full review of Scottish football starting with an investigation into how the SFA contributed to the UK taxpayer subsidising one club with money that should have gone on public services.
Its a suggestion, other passive forms on those lines welcome. It has to be something all clubs do if they are on camera.
Ron Bacardi on 6th July 2017 7:40 pm
I think SPL and SPFL have same Company number – you know what that means lol.
Auldheid,
A very good suggestion. Any particular for choosing the 14 minute?
Just in from work and no read CQN today.
Has Murray and his tax dodging cheating mob had their titles stripped yet?
MIKE IN TORONTO @ 7:20 PM,
anyone know anyone in Hamburg?
Apparently, Trump’s people delayed in booking a hotel for the upcoming G20 meeting in Hamburg, and apparently all hotels are now booked solid …
anyone know anyone that might have a spare couch that Trump could kip on?
I always use the Four Seasons… never had a problem booking… tell him he can “drop” my name.
If not last time I was there, there was a lovely lassie in the Reeperbahn offered to put me up, very accommodating folk you’ll find:)
Hail Hail
Oh Dear, so, so much wrong with this
https://www.gotthebattlefeveron.com/2017/7/6/15927540/is-it-time-for-rangers-fans-to-boycott-scottish-football-spfl-ebts
And feck off while you are at it, the game will flourish without you
If every match that the Huns EBT’s merchants played in reverts to a 3-0 defeat do we still get to keep the 6-2 game? :))
Huns, ‘let’s boycott Scottish football’
Everyone else, ‘Bye then’
BROGAN ROGAN TREVINO AND HOGAN on 6TH JULY 2017 7:34 PM
And how do we get to the table to ask those questions?
Keep the Faith!
Hail Hail!
TeT
I loved the top division without any hun scum present the last few years. Hate them in it.
Auldheid.
My suggestion, at a pre-arranged time, everyone stands…….
“Stand Up For Fairness”……. is the message…….same m.o. as before explain to the media and other clubs why it is being done.
Anyone have the SPL (not SPFL) Articles of Association and Rules ?
Leave the boycotts and aggressive stance to them. We really need all fair-minded and honest football fans to come together on this.
Delaneys
I didn’t go obviously, but from the outside looking in there seemed a feeling of goodness, with thems back that has gone, the hate is back, sad but there you go.
I wanted them gone when they first died, then their pain was great, now more than ever I want their bastard incarnation gone for ever, with them around the game will never recover.
HH
Bankie
I hope every club in Scotland’s fitba supporters should protest outside Hampden demanding a clean game and stripping of cheats titles. Cleanse the game.
Think Auldheid selected 14th minute because 14 “really” tainted trophies
HH
TeT
The bile is back wi the hun scum back, tribute act or no, different shite same flies.
Wish I lived where you do.