The SPL's Title Stripping case has collapsed, given Juninho precedent.

[OlegKuznetsov 10,816]

Critics and haters were saying that there were over 100 EBT beneficiaries but only 35 of them did breach tax law, but that those breaches could justify title stripping.

I looked for this figure of "35" in the document and it appears in the margin numerically and numerously. There is no example of "thirty five" as text in the document.

In the actual body of the document, these are the only relevant passages:

In the termination of employment of some 35 employees, it would appear

35 that payment in lieu of notice, transfer fee entitlement, inducement payment

were paid through the trust mechanism. What would appear to be s403

payments were also settled via the trust with the £30,000 exemption being

utilised through payroll.

Termination Payments

96. The Respondents’ witnesses gave evidence regarding payments via the

remuneration trust on the occasion when employment was terminated, with some 35

sub-trusts being identified as having been used to make what would have appeared to

be termination payments. Most of these payments concerned footballing employees,

30 with three non-footballing employees: Mr Elgin (of Rangers), Mr Bury (of Rangers),

and Mr Indigo, whose payment was made by MGML for his service with Response

Handling Ltd. There is a wide spread in the quantum of payments under this category,

ranging from £1.55 million for Mr Ely (sub-trust 43) to £20,000 for Mr Manchester

(sub-trust 62). I have chosen cases to illustrate where the trust arrangements appeared

35 to have been used to settle: (a) payments in lieu of notice (PILON); (b) the player’s

percentage of his transfer fee; © inducement payment to play for a

Juninho, or rather, his SPL-cleared EBT, is our friend here.

Celtic were let off since their illegal EBT occurred as a termination payment and not for footballing purposes.

Therefore, they have absolutely no case to allege against Rangers as our only questionable payments were of the type the SPL cleared Celtic of in relation to Juninho's EBT.

[elephants stoned 2,994]

But Juninos EBT was just for the craic, Rangers employed sectarian EBTs that sung naughty songs

[DietofWorms 2,070]

This is simply super, Oleg.

[boss 1,941]

Excellent post.

The corrupt SPL has been hoist by their own petard.

[dummiesoot 16,181]

Cue a rules re-write... Oh wait fatty arbuckle is not at work at the moment.

[LucyBlue 2,278]

Save an HRMC appeal of an appeal victory...I think we're quite safe.

[AlBear. 8,499]

We expecting the spl to be fair and even in their rulings? Aye right. At least this strengthens our case should we need to go to court.

[scarkev 3,540]

Excellent well sourced post mate. However I will expect the SFA will rewrite the rule book to suit their own agenda.

[scott12003 718]

who knows what the corrupt SPL will come up with now.

rest assured their self dug hole is getting deeper and deeper

[Big Al 55 9,392]

Didn't the ruling highlight the side letters too, I imagine if SPL witch hunt continues they will be the focus of their argument. However IMO it will be difficult for them to prove they are legally binding contracts guaranteeing payment.

However remember we were found to have broken the rules in some cases, it may be possible they could rule we infringed their SPL laws in those cases.

I predict they will argue the cases where the payments were not adjudged to be loans!

[Ger_onimo 20,488]

Help me out here. The whole title stripping argument revolved around this "financial doping" concept, yes? The concept being that we had "cheated" somehow in order to win the titles.

Today's news tells us that we did NOT cheat the tax-man. Now if we did not cheat the tax-man, who did we cheat? Given that there has never been any sort of wage cap in place in Scotland, to say that any "undeclared" payments to players constitute cheating would be ludicrous.

To my mind, all that leaves is a technicality - that being that we paid money to players without telling the SPL. Maybe a minor breach of the rules, but of no benefit to us and therefore not even close to cheating. Even the "technicality" argument falls down on the fact that we declared the EBTs in our annual accounts and submitted them to the SPL.

So, am I missing something here? Or has the title-stripping wet-dream been killed stone-dead?

[ForeverBlue_Since91 2,895]

Not been a very good month for Rod McKenzie has it. So who is that's cheated you for 11 years you fat ugly bastard?

[AlBear. 8,499]

Didn't the ruling highlight the side letters too, I imagine if SPL witch hunt continues they will be the focus of their argument. However IMO it will be difficult for them to prove they are legally binding contracts guaranteeing payment.

However remember we were found to have broken the rules in some cases, it may be possible they could rule we infringed their SPL laws in those cases.

I predict they will argue the cases where the payments were not adjudged to be loans!

What "side letters"? What are you talking about pal?

[ForeverBlue_Since91 2,895]

Help me out here. The whole title stripping argument revolved around this "financial doping" concept, yes? The concept being that we had "cheated" somehow in order to win the titles.

Today's news tells us that we did NOT cheat the tax-man. Now if we did not cheat the tax-man, who did we cheat? Given that there has never been any sort of wage cap in place Scotland, to say that any "undeclared" payments to players constitute cheating would be ludicrous.

To my mind, all that leaves is a technicality - that being that we paid money to players without telling the SPL. Maybe a minor breach of the rules, but of no benefit to us and therefore not even close to cheating. Even the "technicality" argument falls down on the fact that we declared the EBTs in our annual accounts and submitted them to the SPL.

So, am I missing something here? Or has the title-stripping wet-dream been killed stone-dead?

It has but, you know these cunts they will think of something else to come up with.

What next? Masons are the top men at HMRC? I'm just waiting for this to come out a taigs mouth.

[Big Al 55 9,392]

Help me out here. The whole title stripping argument revolved around this "financial doping" concept, yes? The concept being that we had "cheated" somehow in order to win the titles.

Today's news tells us that we did NOT cheat the tax-man. Now if we did not cheat the tax-man, who did we cheat? Given that there has never been any sort of wage cap in place Scotland, to say that any "undeclared" payments to players constitute cheating would be ludicrous.

To my mind, all that leaves is a technicality - that being that we paid money to players without telling the SPL. Maybe a minor breach of the rules, but of no benefit to us and therefore not even close to cheating. Even the "technicality" argument falls down on the fact that we declared the EBTs in our annual accounts and submitted them to the SPL.

So, am I missing something here? Or has the title-stripping wet-dream been killed stone-dead?

The SPL inquiry or whatever it's called is based on whether or not we provided players with undisclosed payments whereby the side letters constitue a legally binding contract.

They may still be able rule against us if there were side letters in any of those cases.

Nothing the do could surprise me anymore I'm afraid, I don't think it's necessarily over, hope I'm wrong.

[Big Al 55 9,392]

What "side letters"? What are you talking about pal?

One of the reports I read, may be STV, stated that the ruling acknowledged the use of side letters. Those are the letters Britney stated he had seen months ago.

I imagine those are the 'undisclosed contracts' the SPL are alleging constitue proof of dual contracts.

[nelsonRFC82 305]

Moreso than whether any of the individuals have to retrospectively pay tax. The judgement declared, that funds were available to be withdrawn from the trust, it was at the sole discretion of the trustee to approve this and they even refused a few requests...but would accept any reasonable request,

Rangers did not pay any of the players, they put money in to a trust fund and it was the trustee who had discretion as to how these funds were dispersed. How could Rangers be expected to declare payments when registering a contract when they were not in control of these payments?

[Ger_onimo 20,488]

It has but, you know these cunts they will think of something else to come up with.

What next? Masons are the top men at HMRC? I'm just waiting for this to come out a taigs mouth.

I think that's what I'm asking. Is there still a vaguely credible argument they could find for stripping titles, if they really tried?

[AlBear. 8,499]

One of the reports I read, may be STV, stated that the ruling acknowledged the use of side letters. Those are the letters Britney stated he had seen months ago.

I imagine those are the 'undisclosed contracts' the SPL are alleging constitue proof of dual contracts.

Didn't know this.

So, HMRC acknowledged there are "side letters"? But they have said the EBT's were loans so that means these "side letters" aren't contracts, they are loans. So, the spl have no investigation considering they think these "side letters" are contracts when they are actually loans proven by HMRC decision, right?

[Ger_onimo 20,488]

The SPL inquiry or whatever it's called is based on whether or not we provided players with undisclosed payments whereby the side letters constitue a legally binding contract.

They may still be able rule against us if there were side letters in any of those cases.

Nothing the do could surprise me anymore I'm afraid, I don't think it's necessarily over, hope I'm wrong.

But this is what I don't understand. If the "side-letters" existed, they constitute a rule breach, fine. But if we weren't doing anything illegal, why did we conceal them in the first place? What was to be gained from hiding perfectly legal payments to players? And more to the point, how could this rule breach have given us an unfair competitive advantage?

Whatever way I look at it, it seems to me that all we are guilty of is poor administration. And that cannot be an offence worthy of stripping titles.

[OlegKuznetsov 10,816]

It has but, you know these cunts they will think of something else to come up with.

What next? Masons are the top men at HMRC? I'm just waiting for this to come out a taigs mouth.

This has already been said on Clyde. Surprisingly, they did cut the caller off.

[JCDBigBear 10,927]

Help me out here. The whole title stripping argument revolved around this "financial doping" concept, yes? The concept being that we had "cheated" somehow in order to win the titles.

Today's news tells us that we did NOT cheat the tax-man. Now if we did not cheat the tax-man, who did we cheat? Given that there has never been any sort of wage cap in place in Scotland, to say that any "undeclared" payments to players constitute cheating would be ludicrous.

To my mind, all that leaves is a technicality - that being that we paid money to players without telling the SPL. Maybe a minor breach of the rules, but of no benefit to us and therefore not even close to cheating. Even the "technicality" argument falls down on the fact that we declared the EBTs in our annual accounts and submitted them to the SPL.

So, am I missing something here? Or has the title-stripping wet-dream been killed stone-dead?

The SPL enquiry is solely based on the allegation of "dual contracts". The FTTT has found that the payments were not contractual as wages but were in fact loans (which are still repayable by those who received the money, not the old PLC). What appears to have been paid without tax deduction is severance money through the EBT which is apparently incorrect. That has nothing to do with a dual contract. The SPL case should be dead in the water (unless HMRC appeal). The SPL tribunal can hardly declare the FTTT as being wrong.

[Ger_onimo 20,488]

This has already been said on Clyde. Surprisingly, they did cut the caller off.

Oh FFS! They were all wearing taxman t-shirts yesterday weren't they?

[Quiet Jim 897]

Excellent well sourced post mate. However I will expect the SFA will rewrite the rule book to suit their own agenda.

No, seemingly, Rod McKenzie is ill.

[JCDBigBear 10,927]

Didn't know this.

So, HMRC acknowledged there are "side letters"? But they have said the EBT's were loans so that means these "side letters" aren't contracts, they are loans. So, the spl have no investigation considering they think these "side letters" are contracts when they are actually loans proven by HMRC decision, right?

The "side letters" didn't guarantee payments. The letters were merely advisory not contractual.