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Good read. Good use of facts.

Wonder how long it will take Bluepeter9 to enter the thread and insult everyone. Paranoid Protestants that we are.

When the comparison is presented as balanced and supported with fact, as this is, then it's incomparable to some daft rant. Im sure even BP9 would agree!

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Very good point well made. I wish other Rangers fans would conceding that we were morally wrong on ebt's, it is irrelevant to this case and just gives the other side fuel for their weak argument.

Morality has nothing to do with tax avoidance. If morality came into it, millions of self employed people working in oil and gas for example would not be able to stick their wives down as an employee just to significantly lower a house hold tax burden.

The way taxes are collected is immoral, circumstances dictating a household burden rather than income. One earner in a house with dependants earning 100k pays a huge amount of tax more than a couple both earning 50k.

Clearly the tax system us far too complicated and costs a fortune to administer.

Is that Rangers fault for trying to reduce tax burden.

I wonder how many of those pontificate, then get a mate to do a cash in hand homer, thus depriving the taxman? Hypocrisy at its finest.

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These cunts like English spears and Thompson are feverishly attacking Rangers for one simple reason possibly two. First and foremost reason is to keep them in a job they're nothing without their made up mock offence and when this all this is done and dusted I'm pretty sure they will be referring back-to-back matters whenever they can. Secondly it's a bigot,hateful agenda simple as that especially English he doesn't hide his loyalties.why it's allowed for a man from the south of Ireland to come here and try destroy Scottish football with his bile is beyond me.

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We were not morally wrong to use ebts.

Morals are personal to the individual.

Hanging paedophiles is a moral imperative and common sense in a moral nation. Not everyone agrees witj that tho do they.

I will.say it again, scottish protestants falling for the left wing lie has led us here.

The cosgrove utterances carry no weigjt with self minded achievers, only those that want a share of others wealth . Feed the grievance.

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Facts are the Bheasts biggest enemy. The likes of Spiers etc, should be very careful. It may emerge they have set up limited companies etc to evade paying the maximum tax on money earned.

Certain journalists have no morals, they are employed by the BBC because of their hatred and bias. They constantly attack our club and fans on social media and newspapers, thus making themselves a few bob at the same time. Wouldn't it be awful if their details on tax payments ever made the media?

Spiers pennned this today http://www.heraldscotland.com/sport/14024724.Spiers_on_Sport__Scottish_football_has_become_a_cesspit_of_venom_and_hate/

Yet just 24 hours ago, he wrote the following. There is an argument that further punishment of the club is futile and even vindictive.

What's made Graham change his mind over the last 24 hours?

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Excellent piece and potentially ground breaking. There is no difference in this to the can of worms opened up by HMRC when they started their case against Rangers. Looks like enough there for Mark Daly to make a documentary.

The technical details about how this tax-avoidance scheme works are irrelevant; what matters is the fact that employees of Celtic FC used a loophole to avoid filling the HMRC coffers. This is indisputable.

The twitter comments by Spence and English will stick with them for the rest of their days. These guys have a duty to their profession but have stooped to the level of the most bigoted hate filled of the filth.

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Excellent piece and potentially ground breaking. There is no difference in this to the can of worms opened up by HMRC when they started their case against Rangers. Looks like enough there for Mark Daly to make a documentary.

The technical details about how this tax-avoidance scheme works are irrelevant; what matters is the fact that employees of Celtic FC used a loophole to avoid filling the HMRC coffers. This is indisputable.

The twitter comments by Spence and English will stick with them for the rest of their days. These guys have a duty to their profession but have stooped to the level of the most bigoted hate filled of the filth.

Hating Rangers gets Spiers, Spence and English cash from the BBC. Of all the journalists in Scotland, the BBC have employed these 3 haters along with the likes of McLaughlan etc. They have no moral compass, only a compass for hating Rangers.

They can have no complaints if Bears expose any wrongdoings they've taken part in.

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Can you copy and paste that article mate?

This week has seen an explosion of moral hypocrisy in Scottish football; a moral hypocrisy which sadly has become rather common place in the last five or so years. The catalyst for the latest explosion was HMRC winning its appeal against oldco. Predictably, this ruling has brought fresh calls from various media pundits and high-profile fans to strip Rangers of titles won during years in which EBT’s were used.

The call for title stripping is both morally and legally absurd, and is supported by the weakest of arguments. On the legal side, nothing in the latest appeal had any bearing upon previous rulings regarding sporting advantage, as anyone who has kept up with the facts and doesn’t have a pre-established agenda against the club will admit. The moral argument is also completely flawed, as I will show here.

Some, like Jim Spence, Alex Thomson and Graham Spiers, have argued as follows. Despite being legal at the time of use, because EBT’s took advantage of a loophole Rangers exploited Scottish football for their own benefit, and also exploited the taxpayer. Thus, morally speaking, they “cheated” (Spence, Spiers) and won titles “fraudulently” (Thomson).

However, this argument is an extremely bad one for the following reason. Many clubs, in Scotland and elsewhere, have taken advantage of various tax loopholes. So the conclusion generalizes: if Rangers are guilty for the aforementioned reasons, so are the other clubs. Thus, by parity of reasoning, every club which has ever exploited tax loopholes should be title stripped.

I suspect that Spiers, Thomson, Spence et al. would reject this. But they have given us no principle reason to do so – if Rangers should be title stripped, then so should Celtic, who used EBT’s in 2004-05, and another loophole involving film companies between 2001-2006. So should Arsenal, who used EBT’s between 2001-2006. When the target is Rangers, principle goes out the window – title stripping is discussed with regards to this club by these individuals because they treat it as a special case – a club which they hate. I have seen no arguments by any of these individuals to refute this point. At base, then, we have journalists quick to moralize on one instance (Rangers) but choose to ignore violations of the same moral principle when it comes to other clubs (Celtic, Arsenal, etc). That is clear moral hypocrisy.

To highlight this, I want to look more closely at Celtic’s own tax avoidance scheme. In the early 2000’s, the British government, in an attempt to incentivize domestic film production, provided tax breaks to film companies. Many Celtic players and staff, including CEO Peter Lawwell, director Eric Riley, Neil Lennon, Johan Mjallby and John Hartson established film companies; companies where they would subsequently put money earned from their Celtic contracts. Why did they do this? Simple, because they would avoid taxation on that income (roughly, by spurious ‘investment’ in film technologies). The following displays the various companies, and their beneficiaries:

  1. Bobby Petta - The Film Develpment Partnership II LLP - Feb '04
  2. Chris Sutton - WRP Dryvac LLP - Aug '04
  3. John Hartson - The Mamjam Technology Platform Partnership LLP - Apr '03
  4. Neil Lennon - The Mamjam Technology Platform Partnership LLP - Apr '03
  5. John Harston - The Casedirector Technology Partnership LLP - Apr '03
  6. Neil Lennon - The Casedirector Technology Partnership LLP - Apr '03
  7. Neil Lennon - Ingenious Film Partners 2 LLP - Apr '03
  8. Momo Sylla - Inside Track 1 LLP - Dec '03
  9. Momo Sylla - Ingenious Film Partners LLP - Mar '05
  10. Eric Riley - Inside Track 3 LLP - Jul '03
  11. Johan Mjallby - Malvern Media LLP - Dec '02
  12. Johan Mjallby - Jubilee Film Partnership LLP - Mar '05
  13. Martin O'Neill - Inside Track 2 LLP - Dec '03
  14. Martin O'Neill - Inside Track 3 LLP - Dec '03
  15. Peter Lawwell - Inside Track 3 LLP - Dec '03
  16. Alan Thompson - Owen Film Partnership LLP - Apr '06
  17. Alan Thompson - The Film Development Partnership II - Sep '03
  18. Alan Thompson - D IV LLP - Sep '03
  19. Stan Varga - The Gala Film Partners LLP - Feb '04
  20. Stan Varga - Innvotec 3 LLP - Mar '05
  21. Stan Varga - Innvotec 6 LLP - Mar '05
  22. Stan Varga - The Invicta Film Partnership No 23 LLP - Mar '06
  23. Craig Bellamy - Cherwell Films LLP - Mar '05
  24. Craig Bellamy - Orwell Films LLP - Mar '05

For my purposes, the technical details about how this tax-avoidance scheme works are irrelevant; what matters is the fact that employees of Celtic FC used a loophole to avoid filling the HMRC coffers. This is indisputable. For more on the technical details, see:

http://williampoole.blogspot.ca/2013/02/wp-archives-jun-04-2012-celtic.html

http://www.<No links to this website>/news/neil-lennon-tax-scheme-blow-1173612

So why, if morality and doing the right thing are so important to Spiers, Thomson, Spence and a host of other bloggers, journalists, etc., then why are these individuals, and their employer, Celtic FC, not being chastised and denigrated as “tax cheats”? For there is no principled reason for the moral argument, as I have called it, to be applied in the case of Rangers but not Celtic (and others). The reason, as you have guessed it, is moral hypocrisy – Rangers are to be held to a different moral standard than Celtic; presumably because these individuals are partial to the latter.

Thus, as my analysis demonstrates, the moral argument against Rangers is just bigotry in disguise; a convenient excuse to further kick around a club which has been, since 2012, subjected to all sorts of illegal punishments. This is demagoguery at its worst: faulty arguments and poorly constructed justifications such as these are part of the press-gang tactics being used by various factions in Scotland to cow the SFA into further, unjustified punishment of Rangers. It happened in 2012, and is potentially happening as we speak.

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morally wrong? honestly. If we win the appeal (if there is one) does it make it morally right?

I am no great fan of tax avoidance - from a financial perspective large Corps should be paying more than the man on the street (common sense? :rolleyes:) and as a 40% tax payer that irks me greatly.. But being realistic nobody pays more than they have to and if I could find a way of paying less I would - indeed I have used tax tax relief on child minding vouchers etc to avoid paying more tax than I need to. ISA's are available to everyone that provide some tax relief : simply because some people haven't got the money to take advantage of them doesn't make them morally wrong - and everyone that uses an ISA is to a certain extent avoiding paying tax they dont have to - its the main incentive of the scheme. Its no more wrong morally for us that it is for the people on the list, or Take That or Jimmy Carr.

The Govt can simply make it legally wrong and there is no argument. Its therefore criminal or its not. One mans morality is another mans sanctimony and so of us are too quick to self flagellate.

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morally wrong? honestly. If we win the appeal (if there is one) does it make it morally right?

I am no great fan of tax avoidance - from a financial perspective large Corps should be paying more than the man on the street (common sense? :rolleyes:) and as a 40% tax payer that irks me greatly.. But being realistic nobody pays more than they have to and if I could find a way of paying less I would - indeed I have used tax tax relief on child minding vouchers etc to avoid paying more tax than I need to. ISA's are available to everyone that provide some tax relief : simply because some people haven't got the money to take advantage of them doesn't make them morally wrong - and everyone that uses an ISA is to a certain extent avoiding paying tax they dont have to - its the main incentive of the scheme. Its no more wrong morally for us that it is for the people on the list, or Take That or Jimmy Carr.

The Govt can simply make it legally wrong and there is no argument. Its therefore criminal or its not. One mans morality is another mans sanctimony and so of us are too quick to self flagellate.

This is about defending Rangers not about morals.

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Just to make sure this argument is water tight, can someone explain if the Tims (the Club, that is) were actually involved with this tax dodge with the film companies?

Because there's no point in us making fools of ourselves arguing that they are in the same boat as us by using a tax avoidance scheme therefore their web-toed fans can't claim any moral superiority and asking for title stripping when it wasn't actually CFC but rather their players as individuals.

They're trying to say Rangers Football Club are the big baddies but we can't say that their Club isn't any better if it wasn't actually the Club who paid into the film production scheme.

The fact that they used EBTs, however, is interesting especially when added in to the mix that they were one of few companies who used them that paid back all the tax without being asked (as mentioned in someone else's post, maybe Oleg) but also has a Dr Death as an ardent fan, who was also on the board at one point.

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Nothing morally wrong with trying to save your company paying large tax bills, indeed it's the duty of directors to do so.

I would argue that tax in itself is morally wrong, bit like the mafia asking for protection money only the government do it for the greater good.

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Just to make sure this argument is water tight, can someone explain if the Tims (the Club, that is) were actually involved with this tax dodge with the film companies?

Because there's no point in us making fools of ourselves arguing that they are in the same boat as us by using a tax avoidance scheme therefore their web-toed fans can't claim any moral superiority and asking for title stripping when it wasn't actually CFC but rather their players as individuals.

They're trying to say Rangers Football Club are the big baddies but we can't say that their Club isn't any better if it wasn't actually the Club who paid into the film production scheme.

The fact that they used EBTs, however, is interesting especially when added in to the mix that they were one of few companies who used them that paid back all the tax without being asked (as mentioned in someone else's post, maybe Oleg) but also has a Dr Death as an ardent fan, who was also on the board at one point.

Absolutely no expert on this, but you have a fair point. Possibly valid if the club had guaranteed a net sum and gave them side letters confirming that the club would underwrite/took the liability any taxes falling due for whatever as it was in our case, hence the allegation of affording/attracting better players than we might have otherwise. I think?!

Does someone then request an investigation into this by the SFA and would they even listen? Again I don't really know, but it sounds perfectly logical on the grounds of a level playing field.

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Morality has nothing to do with tax avoidance. If morality came into it, millions of self employed people working in oil and gas for example would not be able to stick their wives down as an employee just to significantly lower a house hold tax burden.

The way taxes are collected is immoral, circumstances dictating a household burden rather than income. One earner in a house with dependants earning 100k pays a huge amount of tax more than a couple both earning 50k.

Clearly the tax system us far too complicated and costs a fortune to administer.

Is that Rangers fault for trying to reduce tax burden.

I wonder how many of those pontificate, then get a mate to do a cash in hand homer, thus depriving the taxman? Hypocrisy at its finest.

Agree entirely. I'd use an ebt tomorrow if it was on offer. If it meant being able to give more money to my family for their security.

The tax system is far to complicated. Mainly so it keeps politicians, lawyers and accountants in a job and in control of our country.

Simplifying the system would mean the likes of engineers, doctors and other more noble professions leading the way. And we can't have that, can we!

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