Ken Bates: "An Ex-Chairman Is A Nobody"
>From www.twohundredpercent.net
OK, we all know that Ken Bates is an unpopular individual in footballing
circles. He is still, though, not as unpopular as he ought to be. There are
still those in football, watchers, participants and commentators, who are
happy to file Bates under "character," or give him credit where it is not
entirely due. To far too many people, Bates still represents a flash of
excitement and unpredictability in a game whose participants are coached
more rigorously in "dealing" with the media than kicking with their weaker
foot; a game which usually only lets its guard drop in the ugliest fashion
(check Chelsea FC's latest travails for details). Bates "tells it like it
is," and "isn't afraid to speak his mind." But while "those who speak their
mind often have nothing to say," Bates has been filing column inches on
sports pages throughout my lifetime (OK, maybe that's taking things too
personally), since he first came to footballing prominence, as Oldham
Athletic chairman in 1965.
Famously, he shared half a chapter of Arthur Hopcraft's timeless book The
Football Man, representative as he seemed to be of the thrusting new
entrepreneurial spirit of modern football circa 1968. In it he was
contrasted with the old-school (literally and figuratively) occupant of the
Arsenal chair, Denis Hill-Wood. Hopcraft wrote of the pair that they were
"definitively, the representatives of the public school and Brick Street
secondary in the boardroom, the one committed to duty, the other responding
to opportunity." And he wasn't trying to be unkind to Bates. However, Bates
status as the next big thing lasted barely longer than it took Hopcraft to
finish the chapter, and the Bates passages in the book are the ones to which
history has been unkindest. Bates was rather more famed in the 1970s for his
property and finance dealings, the (ahem) mixed results of which were
catalogued in Tom Bower's darker but no less timeless 2003 football book
Broken Dreams. And the 80s and 90s, we all know about - especially in West
London and (West) Yorkshire (and Geneva. and the British Virgin Islands. and
the Cayman Isl. you get the message).
Despite, or perhaps because of, his notoriety, journalistic tolerance of
Bates has been shown by likely sources such as the Daily Mail and less
likely ones such as the Independent. His quotability has too often proved
more important than his credibility. In an exclusive interview with the
Mail's Des Kelly in August 2010 ("Leeds United chairman Ken Bates has one
more trademark blast"), Bates' "trademark" rudeness about a former FA
colleague was too much for the paper's lawyers, who advised Kelly to "remove
the name of an old adversary at the FA on the grounds that the remarks show
'malice'." Given that Bates was relatively fresh from a crushing legal
defeat where his remarks in Leeds United programme notes were deemed "grave"
libels, was this admirable bravado ("telling it like it is") or arrogant,
ignorant, pig-headed stupidity? Kelly also rather lightly dismissed as "an
array of colourful tales" further unprintable comments "that would have us
both in the High Court if they were repeated here in full."
He puts Bates' tale-telling down to the fact that "he loves being a
somebody" (as Bates himself said, dismissing talk of retirement from
football, "an ex-chairman is a nobody."). "Half the foreign owners don't
have a clue. Most of the clubs who are in the s**t are, or were recently,
under foreign ownership," Bates added, ticking casual xenophobia off his
list of things to do that day. Kelly let this go unchallenged, to Bates'
face, in the article and when Bates cites examples such as Hull City, Derby
County and Notts County, where many of the placers in the s**t were most
definitely domestic. Similarly unchallenged was Bates sneering dismissal,
overloaded with irony, of prospective investors in Leeds. In terminology
which might yet have a modern significance, Bates talks of the "number of
people who say they represent the brother or a cousin of some sheikh or
sultan who plans to bring me untold millions. I always say 'Oh yeah? Then
bring me proof of identity." This is Ken Bates; demanding proof of identity
of potential investors/owners. And Kelly appears not to even bat an eyelid,
let alone ask him how Astor Investment Holdings is getting on, the firm
prepared to lose GBP18m of its "investments" so long as Bates remained Leeds
chairman after he took them into administration in May 2007.
The Independent newspaper's headline writer continues the explosives theme
with "Lunch with Ken Bates, and it really is a blast" as a headline for
Brian Viner's interview a month after Kelly's PR piece. Viner, a loss to the
Indie's pages, gives Bates virtually free rein to run through his
prejudices. On the subject of admission prices, which have been high enough
to test many loyalties among an admirably loyal fan base, he moaned: "One
woman asked me to do a deal for students. She said her son can't afford to
come. Then get a bloody job, then." Also: "The disabled get their helper in
for free, if they pay for a full-price ticket, which means they get in for
half-price. I'm not being funny but if you've got a bad back, do you need a
helper?" Well, quite conceivably. It seemed a dismal question, but may just
have been a set up for a dismal gag: "We asked them to prove they were
disabled and some of them did a runner."
Viner also quotes from one of Bates' non-libellous programme columns just
before the 2010 general election: "You could. vote for the Icelandic Volcano
Party. After all, they have done more to stop immigration in the last seven
days than Labour has for 13 years," wrote Bates, living in Monaco, so as to
avoid paying the taxes that fund the UK's border authorities. So he was
right. He wasn't being funny. I could also throw in his constant swearing in
front of his constantly disapproving wife. And how he invited her to the
lunch over which he alone was being interviewed and, moments after a rant
about scroungers and there being no such thing as a free lunch, wormed his
way out of paying. But there are more serious points to make. An even darker
side of Bates has emerged in recent and semi-recent court judgments. Judges
and the "real world" may not always seem entirely adjacent. But more than
one judge has felt the need to break the linguistic shackles of legalese to
really "tell it like it is," about Bates.
In 2008, Bates presented himself as the stout defender of the Leeds faith,
much in the way that Charles Green is currently doing so at the Rangers FC.
Bates publicly opposed the Football League's deduction of 15 points for
failing to exit administration (into which they'd fallen because of an
inability to pay debts run up under Bates' chairmanship) in 2007. And he
called for the resignation of the then League chairman, Sir Brian Mawhinney,
and the entire board after Leeds comprehensively. er. lost the legal
proceedings they took against the deduction. But Leeds had actually not only
AGREED the points deduction, they had further agreed not to instigate legal
proceedings against it, an agreement they reneged on. Leeds case "begins and
ends with (this) agreement," noted an FA Arbitration Panel. "The Tribunal
dismisses (Leeds') claim on this ground alone," the Panel's report added,
with a force and rhythm which suggested they could have ended the sentence
"so, f***k off." And Mawhinney chose not to resign, preferring instead to
note, correctly, that "the fact that Ken Bates personalised it on me was a
distraction from the fact that (Leeds) comprehensively lost every argument.
Leeds agreed to accept (a) 15 points (deduction) as a condition of playing
in League One. They signed the agreement, gave their word, then immediately
reneged on it. The arbitration panel were singularly unimpressed with Leeds'
behaviour." "So f**k off," he also could have added, but didn't.
A year later, Bates comprehensively lost the libel case brought against him
by former director Melvyn Levi, who was "gravely" libelled by a number of
personal attacks Bates made upon him in his Leeds match-ay programme column.
The full, lengthy, judgment issued by high court judge Sir Charles Gray
damned Bates and his legal team at almost every turn, ruling that Bates had
made "false and libellous" allegations against Levi in articles which were
"riddled with material inaccuracies," - a phrase which is legalese-lite for
"a pack of lies." And, this summer, it got personal. Bates showed either an
inability or unwillingness to learn from his libel court hammering, which
cost the club an estimated GBP1.5m in costs, on top of any awards made to
Levi - something Bates may have had difficulty justifying to the club's
owners.unless he'd been lying throughout his Leeds tenure about their
identities being different from, and unknown to, him. A year after his
defeats, Bates made Levi the subject of further club-inspired vitriol,
culminating in a series of articles and broadcasts in the Leeds programme
and on the club's in-house radio station, Yorkshire Radio, in the week
before Christmas 2010.
Levi accused Bates of harassment and the case was heard before His Honour
Judge Gosnell in Leeds County Court six months ago. Judge Gosnell found
almost entirely against Bates. And his judgment, issued in June, caught the
headlines with references to Bates' "chilling" disregard for the feelings of
those targeted by his actions. A reading of the whole judgment is more
damning still of Bates. Not just Bates the financial twister. Nor just Bates
the serial "mis-stater" of evidence in courts. But Bates the human being.
And Bates baleful influence on those around him. Judge Gosnell's judgment
takes us through the evidence supplied by the case's claimants and
defendants in turn, with reference to evidence of others which was "relied
upon" by the protagonists. Thus he gave his findings on the quality (or
otherwise) of the evidence from the claimants - Melvyn Levi and his wife
Carole, the defendants - Bates, Leeds United Chief Executive Shaun Harvey on
behalf of both United and the club-owned Yorkshire Radio, Simon Pinkney - a
"process server" from Eclipse Legal Services and Hiren Mistry - a
then-associate of Jersey legal firm Sinels, who represented Leeds in legal
proceedings in Jersey and instructed Eclipse to serve a writ on Levi as part
of those proceedings.
Judge Gosnell wrote that he found Levi to be "a truthful witness who had
been genuinely upset by the articles written, in particular the more recent
history, and that his life had been very significantly affected for the
worse by the whole experience." The judge was also "impressed with (Mrs
Levi) as a truthful witness." But, the "closer" to Bates the witnesses were,
the less favourable the comments. Pinkney, he noted, was "an honest and
straight-forward witness and his evidence was his genuine recollection,"
albeit mistaken. He found Mistry "a helpful and truthful" witness, adding
the minor qualification "overall." Harvey, Leeds' chief executive alongside
Bates as chairman, was "a somewhat defensive witness who was very reluctant
to concede anything which was against the interests of the club." And, in a
subtle but key change of emphasis, Judge Gosnell added: "As a human being,
however, he had the decency to look embarrassed at some of the decisions he
was being forced to defend" (forced, of course, by Bates). "Decency" and
"embarrassment" were not about to appear in any description of Bates "as a
human being." And before giving his findings on Bates the human, Judge
Gosnell, as have so many of his legal colleagues, found that his "evidence
was unreliable".
The judge then made his "chilling" comment, in reference to Bates' "lack of
concern" about the impact of his actions on the claimants, "particularly as
he must have read the medical evidence" on them. And his conclusion on
Bates, though more familiar, was no less condemnatory: "It was a combative
performance in the witness box, with several bad-tempered exchanges with
leading counsel for the claimants." Where Harvey had been embarrassed,
Bates, the judge found, was more of an embarrassment: "At times," he found,
"he seemed more concerned with belittling and criticising Mr (Simon) Myerson
(the aforementioned leading counsel) than giving convincing evidence to the
court." And the judge even dipped a toe in the waters of sarcasm, like a
primary school teacher writing a report on a particularly recalcitrant pupil
with his deadpan observation that "describing the questions as 'pathetic'
and answering 'rubbish' on several occasions did nothing to advance his
case." Finding that Bates' articles and Yorkshire Radio's broadcasts were
"acts of harassment. serious enough to sustain criminal liability in the
event of a breach," Judge Gosnell used terminology present in the relevant
legislation, such as "oppressive and unacceptable", and "unattractive and
boorish," a description Bates has fitted like a glove throughout his public
career.
Bates, therefore, stood condemned professionally and personally. And when
the judge added that "I have to assume that the harassment will stop," you
sensed he wasn't convinced and that he felt he would have to "make whatever
orders are appropriate to prevent it." Bates' recent condemnations of the
Leeds United Supporters Trust (LUST) as "an ignorant, illiterate minority",
coupled with unsubstantiated personal attacks on LUST chairman Gary Cooper,
suggests that Judge Gosnell's scepticism was wise, and that Bates'
inabilities and/or unwillingness to learn lessons remain of an Olympian
standard. Yet there is genuine hope, despite recent delays in Leeds'
takeover, that this really will be it for Bates and football. Even Bates
must realise that he is strictly small-time in modern football; for all his
efforts to persuade Des Kelly of the scale of his attempt to replicate his
Chelsea Village "success" at Leeds, the Mail columnist still had Bates down
as a "small-time property developer." And Bates is probably too old to start
a political career in the UK Independence Party (even though he might not
raise the membership's average age greatly). So there is every prospect
that, soon, if you don't want to hear Ken Bates you won't have to.
Wisely, though, no-one dare count their proverbial chickens. Leeds fans
aren't been paranoid in expressing concerns about the snail's pace and
unclear status of current "takeover" talks. After all, when Freddie Pye was
Stockport County chairman, he famously thought that "these days Ken Bates
has completely lost interest in football." And this was in 1975. But while
we all know football would be better off without chancers and financial
twisters like Bates, it would be better off still without the nasty,
vindictive, arrogant, ignorant, heartless, unattractive and boorish Bates
those who have presided over him in court have found him to be. Bates
himself told Kelly in 2010 that "an ex-chairman is a nobody." It is hard to
imagine a more appropriate way for Bates to live out the rest of his life.
An ex-chairman and a nobody is exactly how this dismal human being deserves
to be remembered.
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PETE CASS (1962 - 2011) Rest In Peace Mate
