In a previous post titled “Labour Party Triangle: Celtic PLC, The Co-operative ‘Ethical’ Bank, Glasgow City Council” we postulated that the Labour Party/Co-operative Party relationship appeared to be link that pulled everything together. We may have found the source(s).
Co-operative Party/Labour Party unity ticket
The previous post highlighted the Co-operative Party’s historic links politically with the Labour Party both in Scottish and Westminster parliaments.
With the links of the Co-operative Party with the Labour Party being particularly strong in Scotland (Note: they are called Labour and Co-operative MSPs and MPs) with:
MPs: Paul Sweeney (Glasgow North East), Gerard Killen (Rutherglen and Hamilton West)
Lords: Lord Foulkes of Cumnock, Lord McFall of Alcluith (Dumbarton)
The Co-operative Group’s control of The Co-operative Bank
Until the Co-operative Bank’s demise in 2013 under the stewardship of Paul Flowers in the disgrace of cocaine, ketamine and rent boys, and the need for the bank to re-capitalise resulting in the bank now being controlled by US hedge funds rather than The Co-operative group. Up until that point amazingly the Co-operative Party was the only political party with a bank.
Just think of that power running through the Co-operative Party, their close mates the Labour Party and deciding/influencing who the ‘Ethical Bank’, the Co-operative Bank loans to and how cheaply they set their interest rates?
Have a look at the header above from James Salmon’s article in the Daily Mail in November 2013 to see how it works. Such was the political influence in giving Celtic the loan/overdraft that the loan rate was 2.35% lower than the Labour Party rate. Looks like Celtic were favoured by the Co-operative Bank/Party even more than their 90 year old political partnership. That shows how outside of the normal those Celtic loan/overdraft rates are.
Labour Party Control of Glasgow
Until the SNP defeated the Labour Party in the Glasgow local authority elections Labour controlled, with a brief interruption of 3 years of no party having overall control in 1977-80, from 1971 until 2017. That’s 43 years. As we have seen some of the SNP currently are the same in different jerseys. Or we should say are wearing the same jersey underneath. That length of time in power naturally embedded favouritism and this always breeds corruption.
Year 2000: Two Top Scottish Celtic Minded Co-operative Party Officials
Well we have found two Celtic-minded persons that overlap several of the above organisations and the period, in 2000, when the Co-operative Bank initially gave Celtic PLC, firstly an UNSECURED loan & overdraft of £31.5 million (from Celtic PLC Annual Report Year Ending 31 June 2000):
Eventually The Co-operative Bank woke up and currently has title for their loan/overdraft on:
Celtic Park
Westthorn (completely unused – was only bought cheaply to give Co-op Bank security)
All the GCC land sold in the Celtic Triangle around Celtic Park
Lennoxtown Training Ground
The big question in 2000 was why, when no other bank would give Celtic a loan did The Co-operative Bank give Celtic such a large loan/overdraft with low interest rates and UNSECURED when Celtic Park was there?
The latter decision being commercial suicide for a bank thus showing that The Co-operative Bank did NOT make this decision based on commercial Risk Management practices. The bank was totally exposed for £31.5m with no security when Celtic’s track record was that it nearly went to the wall 6 years earlier. Financial operating history ignored when a bank was giving a loan – never been heard of before.
Political pressure was applied to get this dodgy loan/overdraft. So who could have used their influence for this to happen?
Well two Top Scottish Celtic Minded Co-operative Party Officials in 2000 are possibly in the frame.
Joe Hill The Celtic Trust Founder and National Convenor of Scottish Co-operative Party
We were looking at The Celtic Trust and came across this academic research report reference on Taylor and Francis which publishes book & research papers:
Of course Jeanette Findlay is there but it’s one of the others that is more interesting.
In the actual site link, positioning the cursor over the names brings up their role/experience and for one Joe Hill it comes up:
Joe Hill Founder member of The Celtic Trust; National Secretary of Scottish Co-operative Party.
So here we have a founder member of The Celtic Trust, the most Irish republican of their supporters group, who was also National Secretary of the Scottish Branch of the Co-operative Party.
Mr Hill is now retired but he is however listed as having been a director of:
Also listed there is another Scotsman, James Joseph Lee, from Hamilton, Lanarkshire:
Both were appointed around the same time, James Lee appointed 4 May 2005 and Joe Hill appointed 4 July 2005 when the company was incorporated 3 May 2005. Very hard for them to say they don’t know each other.
Year 2000 Jim Lee was Chairman of Co-operative Party
In 2000, who was Chairman of the whole Co-operative Party but Jim Lee (from Co-operative Party archives) and had been in that powerful political position since 1996:
Jim Lee, James Joseph Lee, is currently on the Co-operative Party National Executive Committee representing Scotland & Northern Ireland (from Co-operative Party site)
From Jim Lee’s Facebook his son exposes his football allegiance so not so strange to presume Jim also has his links to Celtic too but keeps it hidden for political/union purposes:
Even The Guardian in 2014 noted Mr Lee’s position as former secretary of the Scottish Co-operative party and influential member over the WHOLE Co-op movement which in 2000 included The Co-operative Bank:
Hypothesis Postulated
Loans from The Co-operative Bank obtained through Celtic-minded Scottish Co-operative Party were used with their connections with the Labour Party controlled Glasgow City Council to deliver cheap land which used as security on the loans. This greatly benefited Celtic through cheap interest costs, increased assets on their balance sheet. It all goes round in a circle and reinforces their financial standing and therefore their competitive squad.
The Co-operative Party appears, especially it’s Scottish branch, in being instrumental in 2000 of influencing The Co-operative Bank to award Celtic cheap loan/overdraft. Under Occam’s Razor, the simplest explanation, this is the primary influential political source that applied pressure on the Co-operative Bank to award an UNSECURED loan/overdraft to Celtic. Who else would have that influence?
As the Yank lawyers say about the ‘fruit’ (evidence) obtained from a poisonous tree, all titles obtained since 2000 have been based on the foundations of these Co-operative Bank loans/overdrafts which are stained by political advantage.
That poisonous tree, The Cooperative Bank debt, is still producing ‘fruit’ after 18 years:
And will go on for another 5 years with all the same land mentioned above continuing as security to The Co-operative Bank PLC.
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