SPFL - No Further Action Re: EBTs

[pete 2,499]

 

John Conner will be getting an earwag from his wife.

[BEARGER 1,830]

A short note on tax law for Rangers and Celtic fans

 

Jolyon Maugham

41 mins ago

I write to explain a point of law that has occupied much of my twitter feed for the last couple of days. It may help to say that I am a Queen’s Counsel specialising in tax law. And I have no commercial or personal connection to Rangers (I use that name in a vernaculous rather than a legal sense) or its successor entities or (as far as I am aware) anyone connected with the club or those entities.

 

I have said that it is not accurate to describe Rangers’ use of EBTs as “illegal” or “unlawful”. And here is why.

 

You might think about the purpose of tax law as being to draw lines in the sand: fall on one side of the line and your liability will be (lower) x; fall on the other side and it will be (higher) y. Rangers entered into certain transactions which they hoped and (I understand) expected would attract liability x but which the Supreme Court decided attracted liability y. It is not “illegal” or “unlawful” to attract a higher liability than you want. And nor is it illegal or unlawful to transact to try and attract liability x but to fail and, nevertheless, to attract liability y.

 

We self-assess our liability to tax. Putting it another way, HMRC ask us questions in a self-assessment form, we answer them, and those answers have as their consequence that we owe a particular sum in tax. We also promise HMRC that we believe the answers are right.

 

If we give HMRC answers that lead to the conclusion that we owe x in tax and a court later says that our answers were wrong and we owe y in tax that does not establish, on its own, that we have behaved unlawfully or illegally. It is not unlawful or illegal to make an honest mistake.

 

If, in completing the self-assessment form, we gave answers that we did not believe to be right, we would have behaved unlawfully or illegally. But I am not aware of any evidence that Rangers gave answers in its self-assessment form that it did not believe to be right. And nor, so far as I am aware, is this an allegation that HMRC has advanced.

 

What about a situation where Rangers gave misleading answers to HMRC outside the self-assessment form? Certainly it would be very poor behaviour. And I can imagine circumstances in which this might be unlawful. But, on its own, this fact – if fact it is – does not enable the conclusion to be drawn that Rangers has broken any law.

[JFK-1 1,693]

I like their craziness and not only hope they keep it up but intensify it. The longer these nut cases continue with this irrational babbling the more crazy they will look with the passage of time as every expert in the field continually repeats "cobblers"

 

Let them illustrate how f*%#*d up in the head they are to their hearts content.

[boabie 230]

I like their craziness and not only hope they keep it up but intensify it. The longer these nut cases continue with this irrational babbling the more crazy they will look with the passage of time as every expert in the field continually repeats "cobblers"

 

Let them illustrate how f*%#*d up in the head they are to their hearts content.

 

Their heads are so fecked up that I have absolutely no doubt that were we to be stripped of titles they'd immediately start pestering the whole wide world until a decision was made to award the titles to FC Shame.

[Bearman 9]

Derek Rae: Hard for fans to move on from title-stripping argument, but Scottish football must come together

 

Another zoomer....

 

The SPFL statement issued yesterday may well have stated that there will be no further action taken against Rangers over their use of EBTs, and set out the legal rationale behind the decision, but it would be naïve in the extreme to think that the issue has now been settled in the minds of fans.

 

No matter what the SPFL said, whether that was to move forward with stripping titles or not, they were never going to please everyone.

 

There was always going to be a section on one side of the argument who will not easily move on, and an independent review is unlikely to appease the supporters who feel wronged either.

 

I can understand the point of view of those fans who feel uneasy about the decision not to take any further action. But from the SPFL’s point of view, it was clearly a case of being damned if they did, and damned if they didn’t.

 

It seems clear to me that there should be an asterisk placed beside the years in question where Rangers were artificially inflated by their use of EBTs, and to deny that, I think, would be churlish.

 

I’ve covered football in Italy and Turkey when they had their own cases of serious financial mismanagement at some of their biggest clubs, and there is no easy way of resolving these issues.

 

But whether title-stripping is the answer or not, the one thing that is for sure is that this is an extremely difficult period for Scottish football.

 

Being in America now, it has allowed me to look at the whole situation in Scottish football currently with something of an outsider’s perspective, and I do think that as difficult as it may be, the game really does need all of the clubs to now come together.

 

Looking in from the outside of that Scottish football bubble, I can certainly see the point that Stewart Milne had when the Aberdeen chairman said last week that everyone involved in the game has to move on, even though as a fan, I can see why other supporters might not feel that is so easy to do.

 

But I truly believe the only way we can plot a course forward for our national sport is to work together, and that means everyone pulling in a similar direction.

 

Rangers have to buy back into Scottish football and play an active role in moving the game forward, and by the same token, the other clubs have to accept that they are very much part of it.

 

I increasingly found last season as I covered the Scottish Premiership that the game in our country has become rather po-faced at the top level. It isn’t life or death.

 

We’re supposed to be enjoying a sport that we all love, but with the bigger clubs I found one-upmanship on a scale I’d never encountered before, and the constant grandstanding does become tiresome.

 

When I think about Scottish football, what I really care about is what goes in between those white lines, and I’m sure the majority of supporters up and down the country feel the same.

 

But I’ve said this before - and it is worth repeating - we are pretty peculiar in our country that we spend so much time talking about all the other stuff that goes on around the football, rather than the football itself.

 

Unfortunately, but perhaps understandably in regards to the legitimacy of the honours earned by Rangers during the period in question, this debate will rumble on for many years to come. There was always going to be an outcry at the decision no matter what it was.

 

One can only hope that some day, a consensus can be found so that everyone who cares about Scottish football can come together for the good of the game.

 

Taken from The Evening Tim(e)s.

[Scott7 5,913]

Let's hope this dandy don stays in the US. Pity in a way because he wasn't the worst commentator.

[the gunslinger 3,366]

Derek Rae: Hard for fans to move on from title-stripping argument, but Scottish football must come together

 

Another zoomer....

 

The SPFL statement issued yesterday may well have stated that there will be no further action taken against Rangers over their use of EBTs, and set out the legal rationale behind the decision, but it would be naïve in the extreme to think that the issue has now been settled in the minds of fans.

 

No matter what the SPFL said, whether that was to move forward with stripping titles or not, they were never going to please everyone.

 

There was always going to be a section on one side of the argument who will not easily move on, and an independent review is unlikely to appease the supporters who feel wronged either.

 

I can understand the point of view of those fans who feel uneasy about the decision not to take any further action. But from the SPFL’s point of view, it was clearly a case of being damned if they did, and damned if they didn’t.

 

It seems clear to me that there should be an asterisk placed beside the years in question where Rangers were artificially inflated by their use of EBTs, and to deny that, I think, would be churlish.

 

I’ve covered football in Italy and Turkey when they had their own cases of serious financial mismanagement at some of their biggest clubs, and there is no easy way of resolving these issues.

 

But whether title-stripping is the answer or not, the one thing that is for sure is that this is an extremely difficult period for Scottish football.

 

Being in America now, it has allowed me to look at the whole situation in Scottish football currently with something of an outsider’s perspective, and I do think that as difficult as it may be, the game really does need all of the clubs to now come together.

 

Looking in from the outside of that Scottish football bubble, I can certainly see the point that Stewart Milne had when the Aberdeen chairman said last week that everyone involved in the game has to move on, even though as a fan, I can see why other supporters might not feel that is so easy to do.

 

But I truly believe the only way we can plot a course forward for our national sport is to work together, and that means everyone pulling in a similar direction.

 

Rangers have to buy back into Scottish football and play an active role in moving the game forward, and by the same token, the other clubs have to accept that they are very much part of it.

 

I increasingly found last season as I covered the Scottish Premiership that the game in our country has become rather po-faced at the top level. It isn’t life or death.

 

We’re supposed to be enjoying a sport that we all love, but with the bigger clubs I found one-upmanship on a scale I’d never encountered before, and the constant grandstanding does become tiresome.

 

When I think about Scottish football, what I really care about is what goes in between those white lines, and I’m sure the majority of supporters up and down the country feel the same.

 

But I’ve said this before - and it is worth repeating - we are pretty peculiar in our country that we spend so much time talking about all the other stuff that goes on around the football, rather than the football itself.

 

Unfortunately, but perhaps understandably in regards to the legitimacy of the honours earned by Rangers during the period in question, this debate will rumble on for many years to come. There was always going to be an outcry at the decision no matter what it was.

 

One can only hope that some day, a consensus can be found so that everyone who cares about Scottish football can come together for the good of the game.

 

Taken from The Evening Tim(e)s.

Why? We would have paid the players less and the tax man more. The difference wouldnt have been significant.

 

 

 

 

[The Big Blue Devil 0]

Re: Bearman's post.

 

Zoomer indeed.

 

I love that it vexes the haters so!!!! I rejoice at their desperation.

 

Enjoy people, get the popcorn out.

Edited July 27, 2017 by The Big Blue Devil

[colinstein 294]

I agree that sniggering at their lunacy is something I enjoy

but the whole thing is wearisome now

give me football

ps ITV4 everton europa

[Darthter 542]

We are confident that we can get these titles stripped by the end of this season. The main problem for us was that when the titles were stripped from RCF(IL) the same people would still be in charge of the SFA, SPFL, and the clubs. That is not good enough therefore we have come to the following decision.

 

“Strip The Titles” campaign will be mothballed after today but can be restarted with current plans ready to be put into action if the need arises. At present we don’t anticipate having to restart.

 

The 2 bits in bold really made me laugh.....

basically, "We're confident we'd the outcome we want, but we're not gonna pursue it".....That's like being confident that you have an £80m winning lottery ticket, but not cashing it in.

 

Bottom line is that the Authorities (no laughing at the back) scrutinised their rules & found no way for the issue to be taken any further & that any legal challenge would be laughed out of court.