Re: Season Tickets 2018 : Fri Aug 25, 2017 9:35 am  

So far as the "rugby penalties" are concerned, this seems pretty straightforward to me, and has nothing at all to do with issues around whether or not we are the same company (very 100% clearly, we'renot. That is in liquidation; and there is NO case to eb made that the new company is the same as the old, it's just not).

What happened was that the RFL said "If you want to join as a new member of the club AND PLAY AS BRADFORD BULLS THEN ANY team wanting to play as Bradford Bulls will be subject to the rugby penalties including the -12 points."

So, this is zero to do with "being" the old club, but a separate agreement between a new owner wanting RFL membership, and the conditions the RFL seek to impose if membership is to be granted.

I don't think the other option (start as a brand new club called something else, and begin in C1) was ever on the table)

As for the legal merits of the tribunal claims, as we haven't even seen what the stated legal claims are, it would be impossible to comment on them, and seems pretty pointless to speculate. All we know is that a legal case has been submitted making a connection between the money allegedly due to various employees of the old company, and the new company. The tribunal will need to rule if legally that connection sticks, or doesn't.

In general terms with employment claims, where some new business that looks like the old business carries on in business, you don't look so much at what labels the parties have stuck on the tins, it's what is actually in the tins. As i say, we can't comment on this case, but as to what happened before this case, around the time of our demise and rebirth, certainly I'm almost as clear as mud as to what actually happened and how, given the various announcements from the administrator, parties, RFL, the claim we'd been liquidated, then we hadn't quite, the "unauthorised" RFL discussions with buyers, player meetings with other proposed buyers, the RFL vetos/conditions, and all the other shenanigans and intrigue actually fit together.

Re: Season Tickets 2018 : Fri Aug 25, 2017 11:49 am  

Bradford Bulls, legal pioneers, testing the boundaries of case law since 2011!

Re: Season Tickets 2018 : Fri Aug 25, 2017 11:53 am  

Or not, as we're obviously a new & separate legal entity

Re: Season Tickets 2018 : Sat Aug 26, 2017 9:14 am  

I wouldn't be so confident if I were the new owners, some employee rights are protected when transferring employment from an insolvent business to a new one that is effectively the same business, taking over existing intellectual property rather than assets.

If your employer is insolvent and their business is being transferred or taken over by another company, your employment rights might be protected, depending on the type of insolvency proceeding. There are some differences to the protections offered during a normal transfer.

Employees are entitled to make claims of the new business for any shortfalls in monies owed, if the National Insurance fund doesn't cover all that's due.

If your ‘transferring employer’ (the employer you were originally employed by) is going through insolvency proceedings, you might be owed money by your transferring employer. The responsibility to pay you the full amount of the money owed does not transfer with your employment contract to your new employer.

Your new employer is only responsible for the amount left after you have been paid from the National Insurance Fund. You should be able to make a claim for part of it through the National Insurance Fund for:

salary
holiday pay (for days taken but not paid)
You cant claim redundancy pay or notice pay as your job has not ended.

Remember this is civil law, so it could go either way depending upon the day and whether the judge believes this was actually a transfer or takeover of an insolvent business, as it wasn't liquidated at the time that could well be the clincher.

Whilst it appears obvious that the oldco is culpable, I think the status of the oldco at the time and the negotiations going on separately held by the RFL muddies the waters enough to see it going the players way - if I were the new owners or RFL, I'd be making provision to settle for sure.

I wonder where Nige and Ralph put that money they took for rugby debts!!!

Re: Season Tickets 2018 : Sat Aug 26, 2017 9:20 am  

Back to the original topic of this thread - I simply won't be buying a season ticket until I see the type of squad we have assembled.

So the sooner the owners share their retained list of players for next year the better to get sales moving!

Re: Season Tickets 2018 : Sat Aug 26, 2017 10:20 am  

Frank Whitcombe wrote:

Back to the original topic of this thread - I simply won't be buying a season ticket until I see the type of squad we have assembled.

So the sooner the owners share their retained list of players for next year the better to get sales moving!

We have assembled half decent squads before only to go bust ,so waiting offers no guarantees...

Re: Season Tickets 2018 : Sat Aug 26, 2017 10:34 am  

Wonder if the banks will have anything to say if its proved that we were not liquidated. Did they refund fans season ticket money from the old co because they believed it was liquidated and had not and could not honour the season tickets, and it was now a new club. If it comes out that the RFL allowed the club to be fetched out of admin (which a 12 point deduction and staying in championship says could be the case) maybe,because I dont know the law, the banks refunded money when they did not have to as the same club still existed.
This court case could leave the RFL with a lot of questions to answer.

Re: Season Tickets 2018 : Sat Aug 26, 2017 2:00 pm  

I wonder how something like this could be so badly handled, with negligible clarity and questionable practice. But then put the RFL into the equation and it doesnt surprise me at all.
Total shambles - they are not fit to be a governing body.