The Herald reports

Curbs to halt sports clubs’ profiteering

IAIN WILSON, Chief Reporter June 16 2005

SPORTS club members profiteering by selling land to developers at the expense of future generations of players are to face new curbs.
With green space for housebuilding in Glasgow at a premium, personal gains for members to sell their grounds can be worth more than £100,000 a head.
However, a city council committee has now come up with a simple but effective method of ensuring recreational areas will be retained for the public good. It has recommended clubs will receive relief on their non-domestic rates bills only if their constitutions are amended to require that any surplus income – or gains – will be reinvested in the club or passed to another.
Bill Mann, the millionaire businessman who proposed the crackdown during talks with councillors, last night said he would now put pressure on local authorities across Scotland to come up with similar reforms.
Discretionary rates relief in Glasgow alone last year was worth £430,000 to 80 clubs.
Mr Mann said: "The loss of relief would clearly have a major, immediate impact on club finances, and I now intend to contact the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities to follow Glasgow's lead.
"By clubs having to sign up to the amendment, future generations would be protected from greedy and selfish individuals who happen to be members at a given time but sell for personal gain."
Mr Mann, a former president of the Scottish Cricket Union, won windfalls for many sports clubs in the early 1990s. The financier had successfully campaigned for membership subscriptions to be exempt from VAT, saving amateur sports millions of pounds.
Of Glasgow's move to amend club constitutions, he said: "I never thought I would see the day when I would ask that rates relief be held back.
"However, it is for a very good reason – because I also never thought I would see members sell land, often donated by well-meaning individuals, for personal gain."
The amendment follows protests over the proposed £6m sale of Dowanhill Tennis Club, in the west end of Glasgow, to housebuilders, a deal in which the 57 members would each receive £105,000. At nearby Partickhill Bowling and Tennis Club, different levels of membership have raised the prospect of a sale in which some people would receive £10,000 and others nothing at all.
The National Playing Fields Association has warned at least one recreational area a day is under threat from housing.
Glasgow's financial services committee, which never before had considered how clubs disperse assets, has recommended the new condition on rates relief should start in April.
Ruth Simpson, city treasurer, said: "We hope this incentive to maintain investment in clubs will ensure their survival for generations to come."

note from Ed
Bill was a member of the Glasgow Accies side that won the Unofficial Championship in 1954-55 although this would be disputed by Boroughmuir depending on what basis it was decided.
He also fought battles with the authorites regarding rates relief which benefited sport clubs throughout Scotland

This article was originally posted on 16-Jun-2005, 17:46 by Hugh Barrow.
Last updated by Hugh Barrow on 16-Jun-2005, 17:52.