Got that ?<\/p>\n
Good.<\/p>\n
Ah, no, there’s one or two not read it yet…I’ll wait…<\/p>\n
![\"Image](\"https:\/\/s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com\/originals\/80\/46\/98\/804698589055a40e91e517a329f1dc0d.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Ready…then I’ll continue..<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The conclusion of the trial means that the rest if us can move on.<\/p>\n
For example, Alastair ” Surrender, No ” Johnston has accepted a place on the board of “rangers “, five years after his tenure at the original Rangers came to an end, which was shortly before the original Rangers came to an end.<\/p>\n
There is a five year rule about being a director after you’ve been involved in an insolvency event at one company preventing you from repeating those mistakes at another.<\/p>\n
Happily for Johnston, he’s served his time and can now help his former Rangers boardroom colleagues Dave King and Paul Murray make an arse of things at the new “rangers “.<\/p>\n
The rats are returning to the ship, in the belief that it didn’t sink after all.<\/p>\n
Except, of course, we know it did, and despite their wonderful rhetoric about history and going for 55, reincarnation remains something for storybooks.<\/p>\n
Three of the board that killed Rangers are now in place on the board of the new club.<\/p>\n
Thats your SFA fit and proper persons rule at work.<\/p>\n
And the support ?<\/p>\n
Surely they can see that they are about to be bent over again and have their pockets picked ?<\/p>\n
Shouldn’t the SFA be protecting them, a large part of the customer base that contributed to \u00a0a group turnover of \u00a335.8m last year ?<\/p>\n
Maybe the press should be asking questions, exerting pressure, demanding answers ?<\/p>\n
![\"Image](\"https:\/\/i.makeagif.com\/media\/12-01-2015\/i9wuxh.gif\")
<\/p>\n
Doesn’t look like it.<\/p>\n
At least one of them is in full deflector mode, along with Stewart Regan at the SFA, who , himself should be answering a few questions.<\/p>\n
![](\"https:\/\/pbs.twimg.com\/media\/DBq8W4CXkAA82hi.jpg\")
\u00a0Ah, look.<\/p>\n
He is still alive, and in one of his rare excursions into the public domain, Stewart Regan tried to keep the pressure on Whyte, now, of course, a man innocent beyond all doubt of any crime.<\/p>\n
Regan said;<\/p>\n
“I think the situation that has unfolded over five years is regrettable. It was a unique set of circumstances that was presented to everybody involved at the time and we dealt with it in the best way we could.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n “We considered the facts, we considered the issues and we took advice, and we came up with what in our view were the right steps.”\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n “The fact that five years on we are still talking about it shows just how long the process has taken. It has had a telling effect on Scottish football.<\/em><\/p>\n “We found Craig Whyte not to be a fit and proper person several years ago. He won’t be coming back, he won’t be involved with any football club, he won’t be involved with any member of the Scottish FA.<\/em><\/p>\n “The rules and regulations are very clear. They have been strengthened in recent years.”\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n Strengthened to the point where Dave King, convicted of 41 counts of fraud is a “fit and proper person ” ?<\/p>\n To the point where there are now three members of the old Ibrox board riding around the car park singing “Back in the saddle again” ?<\/p>\n Regan claims that he will “take advice ” on whether or not to pursue Whyte for a fine handed out for “bringing the game into disrepute, proving that irony can be pretty ironic sometimes,<\/p>\n “That will be something we take advice on and, should the opportunity present itself, we would definitely consider that,”<\/em><\/p>\n “There’s been a series of cases and challenges as far as Craig Whyte is concerned and the Scottish FA chose not to pursue that because the cost of recovering that could potentially outweigh the money that would be recovered.<\/em><\/p>\n “He was being challenged through bankruptcy proceedings and a whole host of other cases, so we chose not to pursue that. That is something to consider now.”\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n They didn’t do it then, and they won’t do it now.<\/p>\n But it does keep the attention away from the real story..<\/p>\n By the way..Stewart Regan has been promoted, would you believe…<\/p>\n He’s got a nice little number over at UEFA, following in the footsteps of a couple of others from the SFA…<\/p>\n Scottish FA Chief Executive Stewart Regan has been appointed to the Board of Administration of UEFA Club Competitions SA (UCC).<\/em><\/p>\n A new subsidiary company of UEFA, UCC\u2019s role is to advise and make recommendations to UEFA Club Competitions\u2019 Committee on strategic business matters and opportunities for its consideration before being referred up to the UEFA Executive Committee for approval.<\/em><\/p>\n The announcement was made to the members of the Scottish FA at its Annual General Meeting this morning.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n He played ball, is this his reward ?<\/p>\n Well, lets ask him something… and we’ll go through it from the start..<\/p>\n A lot of what follows is connected to the trial that just finished, so away back and read the piece by James Doleman if you haven’t already…<\/p>\n Did Rangers commit Fraud in 2011 to obtain a UEFA Licence?<\/strong><\/p>\n On 21st March of 2011 Rangers and HMRC agreed that Rangers owed HMRC \u00a32.8m in respect of a liability arising from unpaid and so overdue tax dating from 2000 to 2003 as a result of using a Discounted Options EBT Scheme ruled unlawful in 2010 by an FTT, but discussed postponement of collection to await developments on the Takeover of Rangers by Craig Whyte.<\/em> In his covering statement Rangers Chairman Alistair Johnson said.<\/em><\/p>\n \u201c The exceptional item reflects a provision for a potential tax liability in<\/em> Neither the Note nor covering statement are a true representation of events. As has been confirmed in court testimony the liability was no longer potential, Rangers having admitted they owed HMRC and any discussions were not about disputing the liability as a resolution of that had been reached on 21st March.<\/em> Because of what was reported in the accounts Rangers were granted a UEFA licence according to a draft by Stewart Regan that he passed to Rangers on 7th December 2011 for comment before releasing, but Ranger\u2019s consternation at its contents led to it never seeing the light of day.<\/em><\/p>\n Regan, who has just been appointed to a newly constituted Board of Administration of UEFA Club Competitions SA (UCC)*, used this false information in Rangers signed accounts to justify granting the UEFA licence. He drafted:<\/em> It is noted from the report submitted to the Licensing Committee by Rangers FC’s advisors Grant Thornton UK LLP, dated 30th March 2011, that:<\/em><\/p>\n “All the recorded payroll taxes at 31 December 2010 have, according to the accounting records of the Club since that date been paid in full by 31 March 2011, with the exception of the continuing discussion between the Club and HM Revenue and Customs in relation to a potential liability of \u00a32.8m associated with contributions between 1999 and 2003 into a discounted option scheme. These amounts have been provided for in full within the interim financial statements.”<\/em><\/p>\n Regan continues<\/em><\/p>\n \u2018Since the potential liability was under discussion by Rangers FC and HM Revenue & Customs as at 31st March 2011, it could not be considered an overdue payable as defined by Article 50. We are satisfied that the evidence from all parties complied with Article 50 and, on that basis, a licence was awarded for season 2011-12.\u2019<\/em> If this does not constitute fraud using the definition of fraud by the Advocate Depute above then what does?<\/em><\/p>\n Technical Note: Had HMRC agreed in writing before the 31st March to postpone collection until Takeover then that might have allowed the liability to be excused as an overdue payable under UEFA FFP, but the rules, subsequently confirmed by the Court of Arbitration on Sport (CAS) when both Malaga FC and Giannina FC appealed against sanctions for having an overdue payable to their tax authorities in similar circumstances any agreement has to be signed by the creditor (HMRC in the Rangers case) and in place by 31st March. If such an agreement does exist why was it not mentioned in 2011 in the draft Regan sent Rangers or in any of the responses to Celtic from December 2011 onwards?<\/em><\/p>\n Such a revelation would have been perfectly legitimate to make and no breach of confidentiality given it is what UEFA FFP specifies as a cause for exemption and would have killed Resolution 12 at the 2013 Celtic AGM<\/em><\/p>\n However, it would not mean a false\/fraudulent statement had not been made by Rangers on 1st April 2011 to obtain a practical result, which in this case was obtaining higher income and at same time depriving competitors of it.<\/em><\/p>\n Alistair Johnson, whose trustworthiness is now highly questionable has just been appointed to The Rangers FC Board to join others still there who took part in ensuring RFC got a licence in 2011. Regan no doubt sees Johnson as a fit and proper person.<\/em><\/p>\n When are Celtic and other Scottish clubs going to say to the SFA \u201cenough\u201d? Enough insulting the intelligence of honest football supporters of other clubs and treating them as cash cows whose only purpose is to feed the hubristic thinking and greedy appetite of the crooks on The Ibrox Board?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n You might want to copy that and email it to him, or to the papers, or to the television companies.<\/p>\n We have said that this isn’t going away.<\/p>\n They maybe should have listened….<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Craig Whyte trial is over. The man is innocent on all charges, a result which became apparent when the prosecution witnesses didn’t have anything…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":11548,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/etims.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/hqdefault-1.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2J7If-30e","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/etims.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11546"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/etims.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/etims.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etims.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etims.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11546"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/etims.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11546\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11549,"href":"https:\/\/etims.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11546\/revisions\/11549"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etims.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11548"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/etims.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etims.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etims.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/p>\n
\nIn their Interim Accounts dated 1st April 2011 this liability was referred to under:<\/em>
\nExceptional item (note 1) \u00a31,870.<\/em>
\nNote 1: The exceptional item reflects a provision for a potential tax liability in relation to a Discounted Option Scheme associated with player contributions between 1999 and 2003. A provision for interest of \u00a30.9m has also been included within the interest charge.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nrelation to a Discounted Option Scheme associated with player contributions between 1999 and 2003. Discussions are continuing with HMRC to establish a resolution to the assessments raised.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n
\n \u201cIn explaining the law on fraud generally, Mr Prentice Advocate Depute told the jury fraud involved a ” false pretense, dishonestly made in order to bring about some definite practical result” and suggested “it is not necessary that the result should be actual gain to the offender or loss to someone”.<\/em><\/p>\n
\n \u2018In light of persistent speculation across all media, the Scottish FA would like to clarify the position in regard to Rangers FC’s licence to play in Europe as governed by Article 50 of the UEFA Regulations.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nAccess to the Champions League is the goal of every top club although as subsequent events showed, in the case of Rangers FC, it was essential to their survival. To deny them in 2011 could have hastened the administration then liquidation that eventually took place in 2012 as a result of Rangers failing to qualify for Europe on the field of play, to which they were given access by a license granted under false pretences.<\/em><\/p>\n