The BIG strip the titles thread

[Ken Fitlike]

12 hours ago, hellbhoy said:

One club shat a huge stinking jobby on our game and the head of the SFA was complicit with the club in question and had received EBT payments from the club. That's what you call corruption at the highest level.

nailed it!

[dave.j]

Scams is today's new QC word.
 

How long did you have HB on ignore. An hour? [emoji1]

[strichener]

On 15/07/2017 at 17:52, nacho said:

the exact amount the players were gven in ebts was stated in the accounts every year, the loan portion wasnt disclosed as it wasnt considered a payment rather a loan

Regardless of the disclosure in the accounts, there was a separate requirement to list all remuneration (except reclaimable expenses) when registering players. 

Now explicitly in relation to the accounts, there was no exact amounts that the players were given in EBTs stated every year.  For example in 2005 the following was declared in the accounts:

This is the only mention of EBTs in the whole accounts.  Do you mind pointing out where is details "the exact amount the players were gven (sic)".  Since EBTs were used for all employees, I would hazard a guess that you will find this task impossible.

 

On 15/07/2017 at 21:30, bennett said:

It changes nothing at all. The supreme court decision wasn't about ebt's being legal or illegal, that had already been decided. It reinforces the commissions findings that the loans were indeed loans.

No it doesn't.  It explicitly states that the loans could be extinguished by the "protector" which was to say the player.  So we have the situation where a player's remuneration is directed into a sub-trust that can distribute the funds to the person with the ability to wind-up the sub-trust.  No wonder RFC had to change the company providing the trust services, the whole thing was a sham.

Quote

This statement by the majority of the FTT is accurate in so far as it states what the employee could do while he was protector. But the employee had, as I have said, a power to appoint someone else as protector in his place and that person as protector had power to alter the beneficiaries of the sub-trust. The majority of the FTT recorded (paras 23 and 227) that foreign players who left RFC and moved to reside overseas were able to "unscramble" the legal framework and receive an absolute right to the moneys which had been put in the sub-trust. The majority of the FTT stated that this could be done "only with the consents of those interested in the capital of the sub-trust concerned". I am not persuaded that that is correct. In some cases, such as the one to which the majority expressly referred, the player’s wife cooperated with RFC, the trustee and the player to assign the receivables of the Page 12 sub-trust to the player and thus extinguish the loan. But the power of a replacement protector to alter the beneficiaries may have enabled the player to be nominated as the beneficiary and for him in cooperation with the trustee to extinguish the loan and bring the sub-trust to an end. Dr Poon’s more detailed findings on the termination of sub-trusts in paras 145-151 of her dissenting decision suggest that this device also
was used.

So these "loans" were the equivalent of me withdrawing some money from my Bank Account after my wages have been deposited.

 

On 15/07/2017 at 21:33, bennett said:

A simple administrative error but as the SFAs head of registrations confirmed the players were all properly registered.

 

Or as LNS himself put it:

Quote

Oldco through its senior management decided that such side-letter arrangements should not be disclosed to the football authorities, and the Board of Directors sanctioned the making of payments under the side-letter arrangements without taking any legal or accountancy advice to justify the non-disclosure;

...

There is insufficient evidence before us to enable us to draw any conclusion as to exactly how the senior management of Oldco came to the conclusion that the EBT arrangements did not require to be disclosed to the SPL or the SFA.  In our view, the apparent assumption both that the side-letter arrangements were entirely discretionary, and that they did not form part of any player’s contractual entitlement, was seriously misconceived

...

There is no evidence that the Board of Directors of Oldco took any steps to obtain proper external legal or accountancy advice to the Board as to the risks inherent in agreeing to pay players through the EBT arrangements without disclosure to the football authorities.  The directors of Oldco must bear a heavy responsibility for this.  While there is no question of dishonesty, individual or corporate, we nevertheless take the view that the non-disclosure must be regarded as deliberate, in the sense that a decision was taken that the side-letters need not be or should not be disclosed
 

so not quite an "administrative error".

[Ken Fitlike]

1 hour ago, strichener said:

so not quite an "administrative error".

 

Of course, the bears know all that detail already, but willfully ignore it or argue against it.

Isn't that so,
Nacho?

 

[williemillersmoustache]

so not quite an "administrative error".

I wonder if the question of dishonesty as quoted above, would be answered very differently if the DOS scheme wasn't mysteriously excluded from the enquiry?

[hellbhoy]

6 hours ago, dave.j said:

 

How long did you have HB on ignore. An hour?

He forgot to switch off the "Hellbhoy just posted" sirens and alarms.

[hellbhoy]

2 hours ago, strichener said:

Regardless of the disclosure in the accounts, there was a separate requirement to list all remuneration (except reclaimable expenses) when registering players. 

Now explicitly in relation to the accounts, there was no exact amounts that the players were given in EBTs stated every year.  For example in 2005 the following was declared in the accounts:

This is the only mention of EBTs in the whole accounts.  Do you mind pointing out where is details "the exact amount the players were gven (sic)".  Since EBTs were used for all employees, I would hazard a guess that you will find this task impossible.

 

No it doesn't.  It explicitly states that the loans could be extinguished by the "protector" which was to say the player.  So we have the situation where a player's renumeration is directed into a sub-trust that can distribute the funds to the person with the ability to wind-up the sub-trust.  No wonder RFC had to change the company providing the trust services, the whole thing was a sham.

So these "loans" were the equivalent of me withdrawing some money from my Bank Account after my wages have been deposited.

 

Or as LNS himself put it:

so not quite an "administrative error".

Cue the fuckwits to try to discredit your post in any way they can, like a spelling error perhaps and ignore them pesky facts completely.

[strichener]

1 hour ago, williemillersmoustache said:

 

I wonder if the question of dishonesty as quoted above, would be answered very differently if the DOS scheme wasn't mysteriously excluded from the enquiry?

Nothing mysterious about it - it was quite a deliberately set terms of reference.

[williemillersmoustache]

14 minutes ago, strichener said:

Nothing mysterious about it - it was quite a deliberately set terms of reference.

Aye, the bit of time in which they were shown to be deliberately and dishonestly concealing things from HMRC, got caught by them and had a tantrum, let's avoid talking about that.

[wastecoatwilly]

squeaky bum time

[strichener]

On 16/07/2017 at 12:25, bennett said:

As Lord William Nimmo Smith said title stripping was never an option, the rules didn't allow for it.

Do you seriously want the rulebook to thrown out just because it's sevco?

 

Yet another false statement.

LNS did not state that the title stripping was not in the rules and quite clearly stated that the penalties were entirely at their discretion.

Quote

Under SPL Rule G6.1 we have the power to impose a wide range of sanctions.  Under Rule G6.1.18 we may in addition "make such other direction, sanction or disposal, not expressly provided for in these Rules".

However, we can look specifically at rule G6.1 and see that it contained the following:

Quote

Powers of the Board and Commissions

G6.1 Upon determining that a breach of or failure to fulfil the Rules has been established, the Board or, as the case may be, a Commission may:-

G6.1.1 give a warning as to future conduct;

G6.1.2 give a reprimand;

G6.1.3 impose a fine;

G6.1.4 annul the result of an Official Match;

G6.1.5 order that an Official Match be replayed;

G6.1.6 impose a deduction of points;

G6.1.7 award an Official Match (with such deemed score as it thinks appropriate) to a Club;

G6.1.8 order the playing of an Official Match or Matches behind closed doors;

G6.1.9 order the closure of all or part of a Stadium for such period and for such purposes as it thinks appropriate;

G6.1.10 order the playing of an Official Match or Matches at such Stadium as it thinks appropriate;

G6.1.11 subject to Rule G6.3, order that a Club be expelled from the League;

G6.1.12 withdraw or withhold the award of a title or award;

G6.1.13 order any Club, Club Official or Player to pay compensation to any Club, Player, person or party;

G6.1.14 order any Club, Club Official or Player to comply with any obligation or direction;

G6.1.15 cancel or refuse the Registration of any Player Registered or attempted to be Registered;

G6.1.16 order that a Club concerned be debarred from Registering Players for such period as it thinks appropriate;

G6.1.17 order that any person, persons or group of persons be prohibited from attending at such Official Match or Matches and for such period as it thinks appropriate;

G6.1.18 make such other direction, sanction or disposal, not expressly provided for in these Rules, as it shall think appropriate; and/or

G6.1.19 make such order as to expenses, including the expenses of the Board and/or, as the case may be, Commission and/or other party, as it thinks appropriate.

So you are speaking shite yet again.

[Monkey Tennis]

2 hours ago, strichener said:

Yet another false statement.

LNS did not state that the title stripping was not in the rules and quite clearly stated that the penalties were entirely at their discretion.

However, we can look specifically at rule G6.1 and see that it contained the following:

So you are speaking shite yet again.

I think the point is though, that while a range of sanctions, including withdrawing the award of titles, was available, the facility to find players ineligible retrospectively, wasn't.

That's what LNS used as a means of deeming the players eligible, thereby allowing him to not impose a direct football sanction.

It still sounds ridiculous, but I think it's what Bennett refers to in saying the rules didn't permit it.

The sanction was allowed, but finding Rangers guilty of the relevant offence, didn't seem to be.  

Thoroughly unjust of course, but technically, Bennett was right.  I don't say that lightly.

[williemillersmoustache]

5 minutes ago, Monkey Tennis said:

I think the point is though, that while a range of sanctions, including withdrawing the award of titles, was available, the facility to find players ineligible retrospectively, wasn't.

That's what LNS used as a means of deeming the players eligible, thereby allowing him to not impose a direct football sanction.

It still sounds ridiculous, but I think it's what Bennett refers to in saying the rules didn't permit it.

The sanction was allowed, but finding Rangers guilty of the relevant offence, didn't seem to be.  

Thoroughly unjust of course, but technically, Bennett was right.  I don't say that lightly.

It did ignore precedent though by asserting that you could write players name Michael Mouse and is paid in bananas etc on a player registration and as long as no-one pointed out it was bollocks at the time, it was fine. Which leads us back to the dishonesty/admin error thing. LNS concluded this was done in good faith, while the inclusion of DOS would prove that it wasn't. It was a deliberate and knowing deception. 

[strichener]

43 minutes ago, Monkey Tennis said:

I think the point is though, that while a range of sanctions, including withdrawing the award of titles, was available, the facility to find players ineligible retrospectively, wasn't.

That's what LNS used as a means of deeming the players eligible, thereby allowing him to not impose a direct football sanction.

It still sounds ridiculous, but I think it's what Bennett refers to in saying the rules didn't permit it.

The sanction was allowed, but finding Rangers guilty of the relevant offence, didn't seem to be.  

Thoroughly unjust of course, but technically, Bennett was right.  I don't say that lightly.

I agree with all of the above apart from the last sentence - Bennett was not correct as the rules explicitly did allow the titles to be stripped for any rule breach not just player ineligibility. 

[Monkey Tennis]

2 hours ago, williemillersmoustache said:

It did ignore precedent though by asserting that you could write players name Michael Mouse and is paid in bananas etc on a player registration and as long as no-one pointed out it was bollocks at the time, it was fine. Which leads us back to the dishonesty/admin error thing. LNS concluded this was done in good faith, while the inclusion of DOS would prove that it wasn't. It was a deliberate and knowing deception. 

I agree with every word of that.

I'm not justifying the LNS contradictory nonsense at all.  I'm just attempting to explain why, as Bennett said, the rule book did not appear to permit the title stripping sanction in these particular circumstances.  

It's as if a crime potentially merited a life sentence, but the jury were directed not to find the party guilty of that particular crime.

[williemillersmoustache]

1 minute ago, Monkey Tennis said:

I agree with every word of that.

I'm not justifying the LNS contradictory nonsense at all.  I'm just attempting to explain why, as Bennett said, the rule book did not appear to permit the title stripping sanction in these particular circumstances.  

It's as if a crime potentially merited a life sentence, but the jury were directed not to find the party guilty of that particular crime.

I know, fined £500 and six penalty points for fleeing the scene of a murder at 82mph.

[Monkey Tennis]

1 hour ago, strichener said:

I agree with all of the above apart from the last sentence - Bennett was not correct as the rules explicitly did allow the titles to be stripped for any rule breach not just player ineligibility. 

Ok, but that's a bit irrelevant.

The only offence that opens the door on title stripping, concerns the player registration issue.

[strichener]

27 minutes ago, Monkey Tennis said:

Ok, but that's a bit irrelevant.

The only offence that opens the door on title stripping, concerns the player registration issue.

It is entirely relevant as I have already pointed out.  You are incorrect with this assertion that only player registration issues could result in title stripping, the rules are clear that any breach can result in any of the sanctions that I have listed.

[hellbhoy]

14 minutes ago, strichener said:

It is entirely relevant as I have already pointed out.  You are incorrect with this assertion that only player registration issues could result in title stripping, the rules are clear that any breach can result in any of the sanctions that I have listed.

See all of those punitive measures? I'd throw the fucking lot at the dead Rangers, just about all of them could be applied in retrospect. 

[Monkey Tennis]

48 minutes ago, strichener said:

It is entirely relevant as I have already pointed out.  You are incorrect with this assertion that only player registration issues could result in title stripping, the rules are clear that any breach can result in any of the sanctions that I have listed.

Yes, but none of them are realistically likely to result in any of the more severe sanctions, other than the player registration one.  

If you want to claim that it can realistically happen for anything else, then we're departing from the idea of looking at precedent.