Stopping The Investment
Just had an email telling me I am one of the 785 legacy members. So it only needs 200 idiots to vote no to stop the takeover and bugger up the clubs future. With a regular fan base of 4000 this seems crazy.
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Just had an email telling me I am one of the 785 legacy members. So it only needs 200 idiots to vote no to stop the takeover and bugger up the clubs future. With a regular fan base of 4000 this seems crazy.
Comments
I can't see 200 legacy members voting no personally. But I could see 100 voting no and 100 not voting at all.
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Im voting yes
Labelling people who might possibly vote no 'idiots' before you or they know all the details of the takeover is somewhat insulting, don't you think?
@Chickenhead, you need to go back to when the criteria were originally set to see the context.
The 75% vote in favour of change was a safeguard to ensure that we couldn't fall into the hands of any unscrupulous individuals "by accident".
I, for one, have no reservations about setting the bar so high if we are going to relinquish ownership of our club.
It's up to the Couhig's to convince Legacy Members that they are worthy of becoming the new custodians of the club, noone will consider themselves as idiots if they see fit to not vote in favour.
Anyone calling others idiots for not voting yes before even seeing the proposal, as well as not understanding the reason for the extremely high bar to sell the club isn't someone who's opinion is worth a second glance.
Whatever we think about the rules (and I do think they have been set ridiculously high), they are the rules we have.
Defining those who vote against as "idiots" is idiotic in itself. People may have all sorts of what they consider good reasons to vote how they do. Just because they disagree with you doesn't make them "idiots". Any who choose to vote no are entitled to do so. Any who choose to "positively abstain" are entitled to do so. It would be disappointing in a vote of this nature with the importance so high and each vote so crucial if there was anyone who abstained through apathy.
personally I cant see an alternative to voting yes (if I had a vote), unless some massive detail emerges in the next few weeks.
thanks for clarifying your position Dev after months of sitting on the fence
More idiotic was the clown who sent the email with everyone’s email addresses on it. Data protection breach straight off the bat.
Anyone who thinks we should vote no once details are known should stand up and campaign a no vote. Stating there reasons why. Could be interesting!
Hopefully that won't be needed. I can't remember seeing a single person saying that they're in the "no" camp either on here, Facebook or Twitter so far, lots of shouty "yes" non voters, and a fair share of people waiting to hear the proposal.
Apologies for the idiots comment but the alternative is going back to the season we stayed up at Torquay. Nobody wants to go back to that position. Even after we stayed up that day we were on the verge of going bankrupt if Andrew Howard hadn't stepped in.
Until you've seen the actual bid, how do you know it won't make things worse?
Spot on.
The reason we ended up in the shit before was primarily because the former owner ran WWFC unsustainably, loaned the club money and then wanted it back. So it is entirely reasonable for legacy members to want to scrutinise the prospective new owners and that they may vote against if they aren’t satisfied that adequate protections are in place to avoid a similar situation.
That’s the point every person I have spoken to or read online is either positively for or waiting for further information.
The reason people are legacy members is because they are committed to the club and they are not going to do anything to harm its long term future.
There’s a little bit of panic going on among some supporters. I think it’s going to be a positive vote but in the meantime we have to deal with some of the more jumpy amongst us
I’m sure it wasn’t your intention @BuckinghamBlue but that last sentence sounds almost like a threat. Not that I would necessarily be against, shall we say, a little friendly persuasion - provided of course the deal stands up to scrutiny.
If the Couhigs are voted against, I would think Trevor Stroud would immediately ask for the club to be put into Administration.
That is not quite right @Glenactico. Its a subtle difference but an important one.
The problem at the end of Hayes reign and the thing that came close to killing the club was NOT that he loaned the club money and wanted it back. That is not true. As it happened he wrote off all the loans he had put in while in single ownership and agreed a very generous to the club repayment package for loans that e had inherited from before he had sole ownership. Shareholder Loans are rarely the issue, they are unlikely to be here.
What was the issue when hayes reign came to an end (and would be an issue now) is that the club had financial commitments that it couldn't get out of for the next month and the one after etc that it simply didn't have the cash to pay for. For example it had to pay the utility company, and the players, and PAYE etc etc without enough cash income to do so.
You forgot the bit where when he was questioned about committing to spending above and beyond our means fans were told not to worry about it
Steve Hayes was very good to WWFC when he could have fucked the club up by demanding his money back and putting it into Admin ..... he didn't do this and people only want to see one side of him.
Or perhaps he realised any deal with harsher terms for WWFC would have resulted in our bankruptcy, which would have meant he would have guaranteed himself a much smaller sum of money?
He could indeed have done although it is arguable whether that would have been to his advantage to do so @rmjlondon or whether he would have been shooting himself in the foot.
The point is not whether Hayes was a good guy, a bad guy or somewhere in between, that is simply history now.
The point relevant to the future as it was then is that shareholder loans are unlikely to kill the club. Day to day spending commitments in excess of day to day income that cannot easily be escaped from potentially could. the issue is not how to repay Couhig's loans, it is how to pay the salaries etc the month after he pulls out if the vote goes against him.
He absolutely loves the club, has done for months now.
No way will he allow it to slide into administration
I hope this vote, when it comes, will be conducted by a reputable third party like Electoral Reform Services - the company that administers elections for countless political parties, trade unions, companies and charities and was engaged for the last set of Trust elections (though obviously these were negated when competition for Trevor Stroud's seat dropped out before polling day).
It's absolutely vital that this legacy member vote is conducted to rigorous standards and overseen by an impartial third party, to prevent any suspicion of dark practices. Maybe this email that @Chickenhead received today confirms this?
The suggestion by @kiscokid that legacy members were not BCCed in is extremely worrying. If true it demonstrates an abject lack of professionalism and leaves the legacy members open to attempts at improper influence. A very bad sign indeed.
He is correct that all legacy members emails have been exposed to each other, but I feel it was more likely a genuine, easily done, if not very amateur mistake.
I've been on the legacy members whatsapp group for a while now. Saves having to buy the Daily Mail
To be honest @eric_plant , I doubt Mr Couhig would give a flying flamingo (to borrow a phrase) about the club if he was voted out, but I suspect he would care about both his reputation and getting his money back in that situation. Neither of those would benefit from HIM putting the club into administration.
Unlikely though that he would put more money into the club to pay the next months wages etc. and without that administration (and potentially worse) may well follow.
so in your opinion, we are effectively already in hock to someone you believe is falsely claiming to be in love with everything about the club purely in order to get 75% ownership of it?
What do you believe that says about his character?
Exactly the big worry.
Even as an absolute cynic, I've been optimistic about the investment, and the Couhigs are making the right PR moves / sounds... BUT
He's clearly a bright guy, and to get to his level of wealth / power you need to be ruthless and good at what you do.
In this case, what he needs to do, is sell hisself to the club's supporters to get voting support, and the cynic in me says he would have done / said everything even if he wasn't genuine... That's his job. And as a backup plan, loan the club money that they can't pay back, so those who aren't sweet talked into the deal are scared into it.
I seriously hope (and believe) that Couhig isn't a shady character like that, but the actions so far don't guarantee it...That's why the proposal needs proper scrutiny, and why anyone screaming at anyone who isn't ready to hand over full control is either desperately naive, don't care about the long term future of the club and /or downright thick.
I've heard a lot talked about his "level of wealth"
What is it exactly? Does anyone know how much money he's got?