Into the Bear Pit: The Explosive Autobiography by Craig Whyte

Author:Craig Whyte [Whyte, Craig]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781909715646
Google: TTPdywEACAAJ
Amazon: B086V4TMH8
Publisher: Arena Sport
Published: 2020-02-13T23:00:00+00:00

THIRTEEN

BIGGART BAILLIE OFFICES, Glasgow, February 14, 2012

I was sitting in the lawyers’ office with David Grier, Paul Clark and David Whitehouse of Duff and Phelps. They were explaining to me the development with HMRC that was allowing them to be administrators.

‘This is great news,’ I said. ‘Well done.’

I looked around but my smile was not being returned. Paul Clark visibly tensed up. That was when I knew. They weren’t on my side any more.

Suddenly I was on my own, exposed – a starring role in my very own St Valentine’s Day massacre. I looked around at the stern faces staring back at me. There wasn’t a lot of love in the room. For the first time since getting involved in this bizarre deal I had the feeling my own personal guarantee to Octopus was at risk. I had always believed that as long as there was a club called Rangers playing out of Ibrox with me in charge, the Ticketus investment was safe. Was I still going to be in charge?

If I’d known what was going to happen I would have tested HMRC’s challenge to our notice period in court. Instead we capitulated – my thinking being that having Duff and Phelps in there would be better than any HMRC-appointed agents. As it was Duff and Phelps were as difficult for me as any firm HMRC could have appointed.

Now Duff and Phelps were acting with HMRC, anything could happen. And it did. That day, HMRC forced Rangers FC into administration. The situation was spinning out of my control.

HMRC put restrictions on Duff and Phelps, but basically they were happy for them to be the administrators. I had appealed the ‘small tax case’, the discounted option scheme liability. However, Duff and Phelps backed down and agreed with HMRC that they would accept that as a liability. This was, of course, the result HMRC wanted.

As MCR, I had brought them into this deal. I had considered David Grier, in particular, a friend. I now felt as though I was being frozen out.

If I’d got the month’s notice, as I’d been advised, all the cash that was in the bank would have gone on salary payments and other things that had to be paid and there would be no money left for them to get their hands on. If that had happened they would have been forced to do things differently.

My opinion, later confirmed in legal documents, was that the very hard line of HMRC and the possibility of an uncapped fee placed them in a conflicted situation with regard to their allegiance to me. There would then be a potential upside to them from an HMRC driven administration in which they would very much be in the running to get the job. It wasn’t a guarantee and they wouldn’t have known for sure the club was going to go into administration. But in their line of business they knew it was probable they were going to get it.

Once Rangers went into administration, Duff and Phelps could dictate their own fees – that’s what happens in these situations.

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