BDO were under pressure from the start of the Supreme Court hearing into the ‘Big Tax Case’.
The long running saga reached the Supreme Court today with BDO appealing on behalf of Rangers (IL) and the Murray Group.
Having lost their ridiculous claim at the last stage that the payments were discretionary loans Andrew Thornhill QC, representing BDO, decided to throw the tax liability at the players and staff that benefited from the EBT payments.
With the spectre of Hector ready to hit out with demands going back a decade, plus interest and fines. The side letters held by Alex McLeish, Barry Ferguson, Neil McCann and Steven Thomson will provide little protection.
Every supposed “fact” was actually one of Thornhill’s opinions. He knows they are f***ed.
— LegalAgent (@TracingAgent) March 15, 2017
Thornhill just said the players EBT loans were to be repaid…….so why has not a single penny been repaid?
— LegalAgent (@TracingAgent) March 15, 2017
Thornhill is clearly leaving out some very significant details, which gladly are being highlighted by the panel.
— LegalAgent (@TracingAgent) March 15, 2017
The EBT details were discovered during a raid on Ibrox ordered by the Metropolitan Police in 2007 that took away several computers.
Side letters guaranteeing payments into off shore trusts had been set up to allow Rangers greater spending power with HMRC losing out.
Among those to benefit were captain Ferguson who was contracted for only £8,000/week with the comfort of £2.5m going ‘tax free’ into his trust.
In a previous and unrelated case Rangers (IL) were found guilty of tax offences in the payments made to Tore Andre Flo and Ronald de Boer resulting in a tax bill of £2.8m which remained unpaid when the club went into liquidation after HMRC refused a CVA.
