Stewart Regan has opened up a can of worms by commenting on Resolution 12 for the WRONG date.
A dogged group of Celtic shareholders have been demanding answers about why Rangers (IL) were granted a licence to play in UEFA competitions in 2011/12 while having an overdue tax payable on JUNE 30.
Speaking after today’s SFA AGM Regan claimed that the issue related to granting the licence on March 30.
There has never been any dispute over the 30 March licence issue but to ensure fair play in their competitions UEFA have a further check on June 30 to ensure that clubs competing in their competitions haven’t qualified by avoiding paying tax.
On May 20 Rangers (IL) were handed a demand for £2.8m owed to HER MAJESTY’s Revenue and Customs for payments to players a decade earlier. Rather than settle with Auld Liz, Dave Murray sold the toxic club to a former billionaire for £1 with Allan McGregor,Steven Whittaker and Steve David picking up bumper signing on fees ahead of satisfying HMRC.
Asked by STV Sport about the issue which was covered by an advert in a Swiss newspaper today Regan said: “There has been a reply. We’ve been in dialogue with Celtic Football Club on the matter.
“My understanding is that the requisitioners have accepted that they have no issues with the granting of the licence to Rangers in 2011. What they do have an issue with is the monitoring period immediately following that licence in March 2011.
“Our position on that is that we have complied with Uefa requirements in the period immediately following March 2011 and clearly if there is still an issue with the requisitioners then that’s for them to take up with Uefa.
“We’ve said if they do that then we’ll fully cooperate and comply with any requests for information from Uefa and we’ve provided details at Uefa for the requisitioners to make contact.
“So we believe that the matter has been communicated to those involved and they will deal with it as they see fit.”
Regan’s ‘understanding’ of the issue seems very much at odds with the Celtic shareholders that raised the matter and have been stonewalled by the SFA.
Had the SFA fully applied UEFA regulations HMRC would have received a £2.8m payment in June 2011 otherwise Celtic would have replaced the Ibrox club in the Champions League qualifiers.
Having finally gone public clinging onto the March 30 deadline Regan will now have a job on his hands explaining why the June 30 deadline wasn’t complied with.
With Campbell Ogilvie, regarded by many as the greatest football administrator ever, and a real nice guy, to call on, Regan and his colleagues ought to have been well aware of the significance of the June 30 deadline.
The £2.8m tax bill arose from illegal payments made to Tore Andre Flo and Ronald de Boer between 2000 and 2003, so far no punishment or sanctions have been served on the Ibrox club for using players whose full earnings hadn’t been disclosed to the SFA.
Last month Dundee United were fined £30,000 and docked three points for fielding two ineligible players in an SPFL match away to Inverness Caley Thistle.