GET THOSE MEDALS STRIPPED AS WELL!

I came across a site yesterday; I think it was somebody on Twitter that posted a link to it. It's the website of chartered accountants BKL, who have more than a passing interest in the use of EBTs. According to this site, HMRC pursued a less tortuous and more direct and common-sense approach at the Court of Session, which elicited a direct and common-sense judgment. The argument was that if a company pays an employee's remuneration to his wife, then it is still a payment of earnings and, therefore, taxable. The same argument applies if the payment is made to someone else, including an offshore account. It doesn't matter what happens afterwards, whether it was passed onto the employee in the form of a 'loan' or whatever; the fact is that as soon as the money is paid it is taxable. The Court of Session agreed.

Since the employer is responsible for PAYE then this leaves Rangers up shit creek. They dodged paying tax deliberately and HMRC wants its money. According to BKL, however, all the players that received such roundabout payments can rest easy. Employees are given credit for PAYE contributions, whether they are made by the employer or not. There are only two circumstances where the employee has to stump up. The first is where the employer failed to pay the tax due to a genuine error or oversight; something which hardly applies in the case of Rangers. The second is when the employee was well aware of what was going on and, indeed, colluded in the non-payment of tax. BKL seem to think that the ex-Rangers employees and their 'loans' are perfectly safe. But are they?

The infamous side contracts surely prove that everybody involved went into it with their eyes open. All those players signed up in the full knowledge that Rangers would not be paying PAYE and they were happy to sign hidden contracts, which they knew would be kept secret in order to swindle HMRC, the Scottish football authorities and the whole of Scottish football. No wonder they're all so desperate to 'move on'. It's not just the Rangers titles that are at risk if a real investigation into the side contracts take place; the likes of Barry Ferguson and Sooperally will be hit where it hurts most: their pockets. They won't just have to pay back the tax they were involved in swindling; they'll have late-payment fees and fines on top of that. Sooperally will be losing a lot of weight as he tosses and turns in his sweat-soaked bed!

A lot of folk are saying that if the Tainted Titles are stripped then the players should keep their winners' medals; I say, should they hell! Get those side letters out and let's see if they can squirm out of the accusation that they colluded in the cheating. As soon as HMRC gets a court to decide that the players are liable for the tax then their medals should be forfeit as well. Cheating bastards!

A new strategy seems to be being employed by some Huns, especially on newspaper forums. Instead of screaming about being the same team, that EBTs were legal etc. etc. they try to turn it back onto us decent folk. They ask questions, like What specific rule did Rangers break?, thinking that they've trumped everyone. Here's an easy question for them: If Rangers didn't gain a sporting advantage through the use of EBTs, then why the hell did they use them?

Meanwhile, Richard Gough has been in the Sun to say that if it turned out that Henrik Larsson had an EBT during the 1997-98 season, then there is no way that Gough would want Celtic's title stripped from them. What a load of shite; he'd jump at the chance and Gregory Campbell would make sure the whole issue was shoved in front of the European Commission. Anyway, he'd better not speak too soon. As well as looking into the EBT payments, we should be insisting that the tax-dodging scheme employed in the 1990s is looked into as well. In Gough's fantasy, Rangers would have won ten in a row. In reality, they probably cheated to win their nine in a row. Much though Gough and our media would like it to go away, this issue is going nowhere.

The aftermath of the Paris killings has been entirely predictable. Miraculously, a passport was found, showing that one of the killers was a Syrian. Apparently, this was later proven to be false and the passport a forgery but that hasn't stopped all the racists and bigots starting up petitions to stop immigration and turn away refugees. My daughter, unfortunately, gets caught up in all this Daily Mail shite and was arguing that most of the refugees were ISIS agents, smuggling arms into Europe to murder us all in our beds. Now, I know the Kalashnikov is the lightest automatic assault rifle in the world but I find it hard to believe that anybody could make it from Syria all the way to France with an AK-47 up his arse!

And then we are told that there is one of the killers on the run, who is described as the 'Most Wanted Man in the World.' This character is a Belgian national and it is believed that others involved were French. So what did the French Government do? They sent planes to bomb Syria, that's what. No doubt many innocents were killed in the process, while others will have had their homes destroyed and end up as refugees. A job well done, eh? Will we now see Syrian flags attached to people's Facebook profile pictures in 'solidarity' with those innocent, Syrian civilians?

Speaking of which, it's really made me sick to my stomach to see people I know display what can only be described as racism and bigotry. As well as 'solidarity' with France, they're posting links to anti-immigration and anti-refugee petitions and, more frighteningly, links to 'Britain First'. In fact, most of the pictures of candles and calls for prayers they're posting have been lifted from the 'Britain First' website. I've even seen folk demanding an apology from the whole of Islam and accusing Muslims of being more concerned with distancing themselves from these incidents than apologising. But why the hell should they apologise? Has Christendom apologised for the 'ethnic cleansing' in Bosnia and other atrocities committed in the name of Christianity? And, as quite a few folk have been pointing out on Twitter, the vast majority of the victims of ISIS are, in fact, Muslims. Obviously, though, the lives of thousands of 'darkies' are not on a par with the lives of white Europeans.

Any Celtic supporters tempted to agree with the turning away of refugees, or even immigrants, should remember the vile Ross McWhirter in the 1970s. He wanted restrictions placed on the number of Irish coming into Britain and campaigned for all Irish people already living here to be registered with the local police. And if anyone Irish stayed at a hotel, or even rented a flat, they should be compelled to provide a signed photograph of themselves. In other words, everybody Irish was to be held accountable for the IRA bombing campaign. No doubt the scheme, if adopted, would have been extended to those of us of Irish descent as well. I remember that there were even calls from some quarters to close all Catholic churches, since all RCs were not to be trusted. Such threats and undisguised bigotry would be entirely familiar to today's Muslim population in Britain.

Finally, a big thanks to Mick at Bampots Utd for promoting my latest book. There have been quite a few copies sold now (understandably, mostly Kindle) and I hope everyone that purchased it enjoys it. Please remember to write a review on Amazon once you've finished!

Halloween Houston dictates his book to Jabba.

Available now in paperback and Kindle on Amazon.