Leeds United <http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/leedsunited> will be forced, before the start of next season, to finally declare who the club's offshore owners are if an agreement passed in principle by the Football League is approved at its meeting next month. The deal - approved despite significant opposition from League One and Two clubs, who objected to the conditions attached to it - will see the Premier League make increased parachute payments to its relegated clubs and enhanced annual "solidarity" payments to the other Football League clubs.
One of the Premier League's stipulations in return is that Championship<http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/championship> clubs must adopt the same rules on transparency as apply in the Premier League, where clubs must identify publicly any individual owning a stake of 10% or above. In the Football League clubs must currently declare who controls them - but privately to the league's chairman and senior executives, not publicly. Leeds United, under the chairmanship of Ken Bates since 2005, have never said who owns the club. The shares are held by the Forward Sports Fund, a company originally registered in the Cayman Islands - a tax haven which guarantees anonymity to shareholders - and has since moved to Nevis, in the West Indies, where a similar lack of transparency applies. The Football League in February passed those controlling Leeds as "fit and proper people", but the owners' identities have never been made public. Now, following promotion to the Championship and the prospective alignment of the rules, Leeds will be required to state who they are. The agreement was passed in principle despite 27 clubs, some of them furious, voting against it. The deal would see the Premier League - using its improved, £3.1bn TV deals for 2010-13 - pay increased parachute payments of £49.4m over four years to each of its own relegated clubs and make larger solidarity payments, totalling £58.5m annually, to the other Football League clubs. The smaller clubs opposed it for four principal reasons. First, they believe that the hugely increased parachute payments would skew competition within the league, and second, they object to 80% of the enhanced solidarity payments being paid to Championship clubs. There is also concern that the Premier League is angling to pay less for the young players its clubs sign from Football League clubs, under a new system of compensation demanded as part of the package. Fourth, many League One and Two clubs bitterly resented the Premier League's take-it-or-leave-it stance, which required Football League clubs to accept the offer in full or lose all the payments the Premier League currently makes, including to community programmes and youth development. That stance was described by one senior League One figure yesterday as "bullying of the worst kind". The agreement was passed on a show of hands, insiders said, because 21 League One and Two clubs felt sufficiently worried about the prospect of losing their funding. However the agreement will have to be passed formally, at the league's summer meeting on 8 June. *Review of the season, page 4* *Dr Michael Benjamin,* _______________________________________________ the Leeds List is an unmoderated mailing list and the list administrators accept no liability for the personal views and opinions of contributors. Leedslist mailing list [email protected] http://list.zetnet.co.uk/mailman/listinfo/leedslist and the hardest time in a sailor's day is to watch the sun as it sails away
