The SFA knew Rangers were using EBT’s in 2009. They did nothing.
HRMC informed the SFA in 2009 that they had obtained evidence, during a search of Ibrox in relation to the Stevens Inquiry, that indicated Rangers’ involvement in a vast tax scam which had cost the Exchequer tens of millions of pounds. This was revealed in detailed documents published online recently by RTC, and which constituted just some of the evidence that was heard at the Supreme Court during the big tax case appeal.
HMRC knew of the existence of the side letters.
They would have informed the SFA of those, as they were a major part of the Revenue’s case against the club. They asked the SFA for assistance, which presumably includes a demand to turn over whatever documents they had in relation to what the Ibrox club was up to.
Did the SFA do so? If they didn’t they helped Rangers to keep the EBT scheme under wraps. But we know for a fact what the governing body didn’t do; which was inform the club that it was opening an immediate case against them for the illegal registration of players.
And why is that important? Well for two very big reasons.
The first of these is simple enough; they allowed the club to keep on defrauding the tax man.
Because Rangers continued using EBT’s well into 2010.
But there’s another reason, and this one is deadly to the so-called regulators; when Sandy Bryson got up at the Lord Nimmo Smith inquiry and gave his shocking, rule-breaking, mind-bending reasons why Rangers’ offences didn’t come with automatic defeats in all the games where players with EBT’s played, part of the SFA’s defence of the club was that the registrations were not invalid because no-one knew they weren’t at the time … even if you believe that arrant nonsense, that explanation certainly does not stand up in light of the SFA’s knowledge of side letters in 2009 and on into the following year.
It means that they knew players were improperly registered for the 2008-09 season, and let that continue into the 2009-10 campaign and for all we know into the 2010-11 one … and what do these seasons have in common? Walter Smith was at Ibrox, after walking out of his job as national coach – for which the club paid no compensation – and they won three titles in a row. The legitimacy of all three of those titles is dubious at the very least.
Perhaps the media just doesn’t like the idea of tearing down Walter’s pedestal, but there has to be someone out there with a yard of guts who gets how serious this is?