A group of Westminster MPs are set to accommodate administrators Rangers FC PLC in London tomorrow in the hope of using whatever influence they have to pull a deal together. Political interference in distressed companies is not uncommon but on this occasion the risks of collateral damage are enormous.
Fifa strictly prohibits political interference in football matters and has banned national teams and their representative clubs from international competition for matters as trivial as politically motivated appointments, never mind overt political lobbying on behalf of a football club in tax delinquency.
Prime Minister, David Cameron, commented on Rangers situation last week, although unlike Scottish First Minister, Alex Salmond, he limited himself to a neutral comment, however, I hear that Treasury officials have already been lobbied to exert pressure on HM Revenue and Customs to agree to whatever necessary to prevent Rangers from suffering the consequences of not paying tax.
Ironically, it’s Celtic and the Scotland national team who are set to suffer. Craig Levein hopes to take his Scotland team into the World Cup qualifying tournament in September while Neil Lennon will hope to give his Celtic team a chance to qualify for the Champions League. Fifa would be delighted to take the British government and football associations down a notch or two after the accusations of bribery at the international body emanating from England when their bid to host the World Cup perished.
Duff and Phelps have nothing to lose from meeting the MPs but with so much at stake for Scotland, Celtic and our other European entrants next season, the Scottish and London politicians must rein-in their over political interference and the SFA must get off their backsides and remind everyone of Fifa rules.
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As pointed out in Ulster-Celts post of 21:14; six of the Hun MP’s pictured are DUP and therefore they really do not give a flying fig about the SPL or Scottish football. If they are involved in talks with the administrators it will because their motivation is the preservation of an institution that represents everything they espouse, supremacy, division and intolerance. It is also a club which the so called ‘Ulster Scots’ claim as their own. They will view Rangers plight as a further plot to denude them of their god given heritage and culture. To paraphrase Winston Churchill’s dad Randolph ‘The Orange card is now being played’
I wonder how the Scots media will react to this. Can you imagine the headlines if Sinn Fein MPs became involved with something relating to Celtic FC.
mrob1967 and bjmac
1. Apologies
2. Thanks for your help (if memory serves me right, they were ghood ghuys)
3. What do you expect from an auld git like me? Copied in links before, but sometimes life gets too complicated and it’s usually because of something which makes it easier for you young ‘uns.
Not a complaint, just doubt I’ll ever catch up with modernity again.
nerverstoptryingcsc
Alex
OK as Valerie Singleton would say– here is one I prepared earlier!
Good Evening,
Has this been the most the most momentous day yet in the Rangers PLC story? Momentous, not in the good and joyous sense, but momentous in the sense that what has finally come out today is of the utmost importance and of outstanding significance in analysing the future of Rangers Football Club and Rangers plc.
I listened to Radio Scotland this evening, where James Traynor spilled over with warnings that the Craig Whyte story was only warming up and wee Chico chipped in with the observation that the SFA and the SPL must surely be looking at the contingency plans for a full blown Liquidation.
There was no reference to Alastair Johnston’s nodding head, or the correct journalistic protocols or practices to be followed this time. No explanations needed or sought as the truth was clear. Craig Whyte has sold Rangers down the Swanee. More precisely he has sold a number of season tickets over a 4 year period, and he has used the money to pay off Lloyds.
Effectively, he has knackered Rangers income stream for the next 4 years. In the interim he has dodged, avoided, disguised and hidden the truth. He has made himself look extremely foolish, naive, dodgy, untrustworthy and just down right suspicious at best.
Is he a fit and proper person to run a company? Hey- judge for yourself? Would you do business with this man? More to the point, would you go into business with this man?
The position is now so bad with Rangers that they are completely done in financially– even if they win the big tax case!
You remember the big tax case don’t you? That’s the case where Rangers may well be found to owe the revenue the kind of debt that not even Craig Whyte can run up!
The likeliehood is, of course , that in a few weeks time a judicial decision will be handed out that will damn the previous Rangers Administration to hell and leave a liability that was run up years ago and from which Rangers were never going to recover– Craig Whyte or no Craig Whyte!
However, the revelations of today must surely spell out Liquidation of Rangers PLC!
Even if it is possible to reach some type of CVA agreement with the current creditors ( excluding the Big Tax case for the moment ) whereby debts are paid over a number of years or at so much in the pound, Carrying the ticketus debt plus any other liability will leave Rangers significantly and demonstrably poorer in the coming years.
Then there is the prospect of no European football? Yet more revenue lost in comparison to previous years.
Then comes the Big Tax Case and whatever figure that comes out with– whatever the number it is impossible to pay—- in a lump sum anyway.
Starved off success and Europe, faced with a smaller ( far smaller ) wage bill and the consequential drop in the standard of player, will the Rangers support turn out in the numbers seen previously? If not, the income drops again with ongoing and ever spiraling consequences!
So against that background what do you do if You are Duff and Phelps?
What route do you consider will be the best way forward for a Rangers Club to play– and play profitably. You might get out of Admin, but what comes out the other side is going to be a pretty sick horse– for a long time. Further it is not a horse that is going to be attractive at the sales, is it?
There are two classes of people who may well be interested in buying the stricken Rangers. Those who are loyal followers of the club and its traditions and history, and those with a far more commercial eye on the prize.
I have no doubt that the latter group will rapidly form the conclusion that the only commercial way forward is liquidation, binning the ticketus deal, regaining the seats to sell, revamping and remodelling the club and regaining the support— somehow. Of couirse, that route is not without difficulty and will have an adverse affect on the club’s history and status. Depending on the view of the rest of Scottish Football it may mean a period of time in the lower leagues– in my opinion deservedly so.
The former group may just have a champion who believes that the maintaining of that history is worth a period of enforced penury, which will ultimately be seen as the legacy of Messrs Murray and Whyte.
I have recently concluded a matter with HMRC where they allowed a not insignificant sum to be repaid over a 6 year period? Could Rangers pay roughly £10Million per year in back taxes and still maintain a place in the SPL?? That would be a tall order for any manager and any Board of Directors I think– no matter the size of the club.
Even Paul Murray’s share issue idea would not deal with that level of debt– although we don’t know whether he really believes Rangers will win or lose the BTC.
No, today spells the end of Rangers PLC loud and clear in my opinion. It is a view I have long held as the only resolution. Yet it is a mystery all the same.
If the club were inevitably going to go bust because of the BTC, why would you come into the fray and so Royally screw things up? Why would you make such a hash of it? Why hold yourself up to ridicule and ignominy? Why spend fortunes on something you bought for a quid knowing that it was going to go bust– surely proper, lengthy , preofessional and expensive due dilligence resulted in the conclusion that this was always going to be a busted flush?
Is Whyte of his head? Is he Walter Mitty? Is he all there in the head department? Or has he just been sent in to be the public face of failure by a hidden force, and perhaps rewarded in turn from some off shore fund- or dare I say it trust?
Whatever the answer to these questions, Radio Scotland tonight made not a single mention of Sir David Murray. Not a whiff, Not a whisper– nothing.
Murray, Whyte and the tangled web of the media, spin doctors and their day to day agenda and take on things. Will we ever get to the bottom of it all?
As has been alluded to on here I am a devotee of Roxy Music and Bryan Ferry. More particularly, I am a big fan of Mr Ferry’s early lyrics, which are highly lauded, descriptive and evocative. They force you to think and ask the odd question– at least that is my take on them.
Throughout the course of the evening one such set of lyrics has been going round and round in my head, as it seems to apply to all the players in this Rangers saga in one way or another. All the old board Members, Whyte and his cronies and their allegations and the counter allegations between them. It covers Whyte’s statments and their reporting in the press from start to end, his alleged wealth and his lack of a plan for when the shit hits he fan– just hope that everything will be alright tomorrow. Glamorus footballers and hidden money men, they are all in there– even a reference to Lloyds.
The song is the title track from the second Roxy album released in 1973.
The last line is not sung. It is whispered by the voice if a sultry female amidst the fading synthisers, and perhaps it has a message for all of us who seek to understand this sorry affair.
For your pleasure
In our present state
Part false part true
Like anything
We present ourselves
The words we use tumble
All over your shoulder
Gravel hard and loose
There all night lying
With your dark horse hiding
Abhorring such extremes
You’re rubbing shoulders
With the stars at night
Shining so bright
Getting older
But you’ll wake up soon
And fight
In the morning
Things you worried about
Last night
Will seem lighter
I hope things
Will turn out right
Old man
Through every step a change
You watch me walk away
Tara tara….
Don’t ask why????????
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVCGTsiedEY
petec
Trust me they will try, they will do everything they can to bring us down, they have nothing to lose.
It is the way they are, if they can’t win, they make sure we don’t, they are worse than spoiled brats, problem is, they can influence what happens to our club.
They must be stopped somehow, resigning is the only answer I feel.
Lennybhoy, “I smell liquid”. I might have to steal that.
Possilbhoy, deleted, again. !*!* Could you PLEASE not use unbroken lines across the page. A space every now and then would remove all the problems.
T.E.T.
Liquidation does look inevitable, good news.
But I think we can all agree they will go down kisking.
Brian Donohue on STV right now being asked if anything political can be done.
He has proposed an enquiry by the Treasury select comittee, that could well be seen as political involvement.
oglach
“I wonder how the Scots media will react to this. Can you imagine the headlines if Sinn Fein MPs became involved with something relating to Celtic FC.”
You raise such a salient point there! But one we all know the answer to…. they’d go berserk!
Why is none of the common sense and astuteness of the CQN posters not being reflected in the wider world of media and politics? I think we know the answer to that, also….
Good point, though, Oglach. Well put!
Regarding Adam Ingram when he was appointed minister of defence a story was brought up that he was a member of the orange walk and a pic appeared of him many yrs ago, he roughly stated he was young at the time and since then had no connections. True or not true only he can tell. The biggest laugh of all is that mps are organising this and as we all know they are the biggest crooks of all so fit in well with that mob. I am sending a letter to my MP and MSP regarding their interference in the big tax robbery.
BRT&H
Bit of an anti climax after the build up bjmac gave you:O)
Wednesday 5 March 2008 MPs form Rangers supporters’ club at Westminster
A group of MPs today put political differences aside to set up a supporters club for their favourite football team.
A group of MPs today put political differences aside to set up a supporters club for their favourite football team.
The Rangers supporters club at Westminster is chaired by former Defence Minister Adam Ingram, an avid fan of the Glasgow club.
And it already has members from across the political spectrum.
Baron Jim Wallace, the former leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats and now a member of the House of Lords, is a vice-chairman along with Conservative MP Eleanor Laing and Democratic Unionist Gregory Campbell.
Labour MP Brian Donohoe is secretary of the club which has already attracted around 20 members.
Mr Ingram, who worked alongside Celtic chairman John Reid at the Northern Ireland Office and the Ministry of Defence, told the official Rangers FC website: “We expect there to be more interest in the coming weeks.
“There are officers of the House, police officers and others who work for MPs. Anyone who works within the Palace of Westminster would be eligible to join.”
Mr Ingram, MP for East Kilbride, admitted members will find it difficult to get to games due to political commitments.
But he added: “This is a group of people who are all Rangers supporters and want to identify themselves with the club, and that can take many forms.
“I was a regular at Ibrox for about three seasons, but when I became a minister ten years ago my Saturdays were at a premium.
“I was working Sunday to Monday and I simply didnt have time to get to games, but no matter where I have travelled in the world I have tried to listen to or watch games when they are on.”
Where is Guy Fawkes when you may need him
Trying to catch up.
When FC Sion persisted in their war against UEFA, through the courts, UEFA eventually told the Swiss FA to sort them out or they would ban all Swiss teams from European competition.
Therefore, if politicians interfere in this instance, I would expect UEFA to slap them down and insist that the SFA apply the rules pertaining to political interference, or else.
It is getting to the point where Celtic will have to declare their position.
What is going to happen is that the sins of the huns are going to be packaged and labelled Whyte/Murray; and buried with them.
The Rangers club and their wonderful, cultured fans are going to be classed as victims, who need to be rescued and reinstated for the benefit of football and the nation.
Acquiesce or Resign.
Paul67
The big question is still out there –
What price history?
Do you want the TFOD to pay off their debts?
Or do you want them to cut and run with some sort of pennies in the pound deal?
My thoughts are that I want them to pay their debts.
They are £36mill down plus penalties for the Big Tax Case.
They are £9mill down due to CW’s cash management regime.
They are still not out of the woods regarding the Wee Tax Case.
They owe odds and ends to just about everyone.
They have a very opaque relationship with Ticketus.
I have no issue with a CVA deal as long as they pay everything off including any interest incurred.
If they can work a pre-pack then we / society lose out.
If they have to resort to some hot auction room action the we / society lose out.
They are a £30mill business to anyone with an ounce of business sense.
SDM’s broke them because he is / was a complete muppet.
He started to imbibe his own waste secretions.
An ego without a clue.
Consequently it is better they pay their debts.
Oglach
Considering their previous attempts to preserve their sacred institutions ended in failure, I would be a very worried man if I was a Hun supporter
UC
Paul67
Apologies – I was suspicious when I saw the link which I had copied, but when I saw my post after it was submitted it didn’t seem like a problem i.e. it was all visible, but on several lines, not just one.
Still, with the help of more competent friends on here, the message got through . Fox on the run by Sweet.
Cheers
Alex
Pangur Ban says:
21 February, 2012 at 22:40
Minister fails to stop Galloway sectarian claim
Published on Wednesday 28 April 2004 01:00
ADAM Ingram, the armed forces minister, failed yesterday in a legal action to stop publication of a book by George Galloway MP in which Mr Ingram is accused of playing the flute in a “sectarian” band in his youth.
The minister tried to obtain an interim interdict against Penguin Books, claiming that an allegation about his involvement in an Orange Order “kick the pope” band was false and defamatory.
However, a judge at the Court of Session ruled that Penguin had an argument that adjectives applied by Mr Galloway to the band, such as “anti-Catholic” and “protestant-supremacist”, were fair comment.
Mr Ingram is currently in Afghanistan, visiting troops. His lawyers accepted in court that for a year as a teenager in the early 1960s, he had been a member of the junior Orange Lodge in Barlanark, Glasgow, and had attended three parades.
But they maintained that Mr Galloway’s claim in his book I’m Not The Only One was made in bad faith. It was highly damaging to Mr Ingram’s reputation, they added, and he feared it could be used by political opponents and damage his chances of re-selection when changes are made to his East Kilbride constituency.
Lord Kingarth was asked by Graeme Henderson, the counsel for Mr Ingram, for an interim interdict to stop Penguin publishing the book, due out this week, or distributing any other document containing allegations that the minister “played the flute in a sectarian, anti-Catholic, protestant-supremacist Orange Order band”.
The court was told that Mr Ingram, 57, was first elected as an MP in 1987, and became a minister in the Northern Ireland office in 1997. He took up his current post in 2001.
It was said that he had made no secret of his membership of the junior Orange Lodge and made it openly known on his appointment to the Northern Ireland office.
Stephen Woolman, QC, for Penguin, said its position was that the statement of playing a flute in an Orange Order band was, in its essentials, true and not defamatory.
Mr Woolman stressed that Mr Ingram was not relying on any innuendo, simply that the words themselves were defamatory.
“Playing the flute carries no obvious defamatory imputation … it is not to the discredit of anyone that he plays the flute,” he said.
“One can only get an allegedly defamatory meaning by establishing innuendo.”
Mr Woolman said that even if the statement could be regarded as defamatory, it was about a period some 40 years ago.
“The passage of time must mean that the thrust of the libel is very substantially reduced, if there indeed is a libel,” he said.
Lord Kingarth decided that he should refuse to grant an interim interdict. He said he had come to the view that the balance of the arguments favoured Penguin.
Having failed to prevent publication, Mr Ingram will consider whether to pursue a defamation action in which he seeks damages from Mr Galloway and Penguin. Mr Ingram was ordered to pay the full costs of the hearing
Think I will try that with hmrc …. ” hello hector, paladin here, what’s that ? …. “I owe u £5k” “tell u what, I will give u a tenner, it’s either that or I’m givin u nothin !”
Dear god, what a dimwit Donahoe is
Yes i know what yer saying Bhoys but 1 of the days I logged in, a poster said he was going in Celtic end at hearts game so I suppose it helped in a way but to be honest they’re sick on that site.
Why does that Dingwall get away with allowing these scumbags to post sick comments on there.
As paul says it is going to get a lot dirtier as their masks are slipping in these dark times of their clubs. Expext a lot more so called clyde, st. mirren fans to emerge..
Just finished watchin the brits…… how bad were blur?
BRTH
great article and a great song to finish with.
PC67
Donahugh MP for Labour states Rangers FC PLC will not be liquidated on Scotland tonight advising a deal will be done with HMRC otherwise they will get nothing.
British MP stating British treasury body HMRC to do a deal or get nothing from his team.
Who pays this guys wages. Us via HMRC by any chance.
Stupid bloody Hun.
MWD
hen1rik
I’ve never even dared check out the other sites…
God knows, this one is scary enough!
HH
:-)
Sir Paul
Are ye sure the Whytey is still the Chairman o’ the G.A.?
Did ye see the note fae.. Alyss.. Ah posted earlier ,Today?
She says
The Tea Leaves, foretell.. that Whitey has Fell.. or. should that be Fallen?
Fell ,is Bettah.. has connotations…
as in..
“I do not like thee, Dr. Fell”…
Yep, it sure looks tae me that Whytey has Fell fae ..Sin??..canny use Grace..so..it must be.. “Fae Sin”
Right?
Right.
Kojo.
Pangur ban
I agree, I think the closer their proverbial backs get to the wall, the truer their colours, nastiness and self-centredness will become.
Paul67, apologies for that.
We all know what our club is & what we are part of. That lot don’t have a clue about their own “institution”, never mind our great family.
Hail Hail
hen1rik 20.56
No response yet from either of them.
HAIL HAIL
I feel a wee letter being formulated and sent to The Leader of the opposition in the house of commons.
MWD
Thanks Ernie Lynch for that as i knew i had seen it before.
BRTH
ha ha ha.. ;-)))))
Can read you like a book though! Away to read your post now, it better be worth it – after all those desparate pleas on twitter for Paul to get us up and running ;-)
HT
You stay out this, irrespective how concise and accurate it is ;-)))))
hh
bjmac
Voguepunter
Yea i Know. He is a Gem ol BJ Mac right enough– and not really a doughnut of Bill Tennant proportions either.
I am hearing that Whytey sold Rangers shares in The Arsenal– all 16 of them– and has pocketed the £200,000 that was paid in return– at least that is what the Record is going to claim I think.
But there is much more to run on this– and bloody miles more from the BTC when the judgement comes in.
Anyway, Can I just thank Taggsybhoy again for all his help with the Vanessa quiz and the money raised through the shirt auction. Bloody marvellous result.
I haven’t been able to get on for the last few nights for some reason so didn’t get the chance to say anything at the crucial time.
Beyond that– what a team our Neil is putting together. The move between Hooper and Stokes for Hooper’s goal was just brilliant, and Charlie’s free kick was a peach.
Hopefully tomorrow night we will march on again.
HH
MWD – couldn’t believe his response to Ron Burgundy there….the arrogance of the twat is shocking! Although, it’s great evidence to send to UEFA!
And why is that fat bigot on STV yet again?!
T4
Phoned Keevins yesterday on the Hotline abt Tommy Burns & Paul Mc Stay fighting agin the odds they didnt know were there thru thems cheating. Didnt make it. But Derek (on the hotline every day) Reid from Dollar did stating “Brines was disastrous and something must be done about him”. Sounds like a threat to me Im amazed it got past Hughs you cant say that radar!!
Ernie L @ 22.41
Don’t you just love them.
Coat trailers and never wizzers.
At least we have some idea who the middle class followers of the TFOD are.
They only did this because we had the first supporters club at Westminster.
Constructive original thought is beyond them.
Just in time for Manchester.
I wonder if they gave evidence to the Home Affairs Select Committee investigation?
Hector
Donahugh who him???
Celticghirlanew
Yes my work was gr8 last week when it cam out on Mon and all day tues they would go into their wee corners and whisper away, even got slated for wearing a green t shirt on the tues so came out wi IS IT A CRIME TO WEAR GREEN NOW.
thomthethim
It’s been cranked up a notch or two now, and it’s getting to the point of Celtic biting the bullit.
Resignation is the only answer, otherwise we will go down with them, I truely believe that is their aim.
MadMitch says:
21 February, 2012 at 22:44
You obviously prefer to play the ‘long’ game and make a decent case for it.
In time, more fans may come round to that way of thinking but for the time being….Let them die.
I really am becoming apoplexed at this continuing biased coverage of their demise on our national media. Did we not just witness a democraticaly elected member of parliment just state “To hell with the taxpayer, ran*kers must survive”?
Okay i may have twisted his words, but that was the meaning.
The question leading up to that comment is really what incensced me the most though. “Should we have a political inquiry?” these people have only one thing in mind…save themselves and to hell with the rest of us!
Where is the voice of the rest of Scottish football in these discussions? Why have STV, BBC et al not invited any input from other fan groups of other teams, the SPL, SFA, UEFA, FIFA? Why is there no input from ordinary members of society that have suffered from austerity cutbacks that could be becasue some of that £49 million they cheated this country out of affected them.
This whole thing is a complete blue wash, that is leaving a very nasty taste in the mouth!