David Murray accuses HMRC of wanting high profile case

Former Rangers owner David Murray has claimed that HMRC are making an example of the Ibrox club.

Following a three day hearing in January the result of a First Tier Tribunal are expected in the next six weeks with HMRC looking to serve a bill for £49m.

Snubbing his favoured Scottish channels the former Ibrox owner gave his first broadcast interview in over a year to Rangers shareholder Jeff Randall of Sky News.

While accusing HMRC of wanting a high profile case the former Rangers chief freely admitted that players benefited from non-contractual, discretionary payments using EBT’s.

The SPL are currently investigating whether players had secondary contracts with Rangers but the admission of discretionary payments will cause further alarm.

Under SFA rules all payments to players must be detailed through one contract. The use of discretionary payments are as illegal as secondary contracts.

“They are trying to sweep up as much tax as possible,” Murray claimed. “We have our QC whose opinion is that we have a strong case.

“This has not just happened overnight Jeff, this has been going on for 10 years.

“What I find concerning, and I have to be aware of sub-judice, I have to watch what I’m saying here, is that Rangers have come under the spotlight more than anyone.

“I think they wanted a high profile case. It’s not quite the same if it’s a concrete company in Crewe or something- they want a high profile case and we’ve fought this vehemently because we don’t think, through our advise, that we’ve done as wrong as they say we have.”

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Explaining the working of the Employee Benefit Trust scheme in more detail Murray added: “We believe that we had a legitimate scheme, we never hid the fact and we believe that it was set up it was non-contractual, it was discretionary so we believe that we have worked the rules.

“I think that you’ll find that there are many lawyers, accountants, bankers many architects, many surveyors, many financial companies that are running similar schemes and are watching for the outcome of this.”

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