I am sorry to have come to this a bit late.
Some clarification: the Agreements were between the AHCT and CCFC Ltd. When Ltd went into Administration there were several arguments between the AHCT, CCFC Ltd, the Administrator and Holdings. One of them centred around the breach by CCFC of the Agreements. The AHCT dealt only with Ltd. This is important because this placed the responsibility for insurance of Academy students with Ltd and not with the AHCT. When Ltd went into Administration we were told by the Administrator that there need be no change because he had been told by CCFC that they had moved everybody into Holdings anyway. This breached the Agreements and put all the liabilities on the shoulders of the Trustees. Fisher knew where the Agreements were because when CCFC had failed to pay the January 2013 invoices, despite Waggott promising that there would be no problem with them, Fisher's excuse was that he "couldn't find any Agreements". I gave him copies on a memory stick. There can therefore be no claim of ignorance. The breach was absolute. The Administrator had said that he had no Academy as it was not in Ltd. This action by CCFC put the AHCT in breach of their Agreements with Coventry Sports Foundation which manages the Centre.
Another of the Agreements covered pitch maintenance. CCFC was not charged anything for the use of the grass pitches. The responsibility for their maintenance was theirs. The equipment (cost £100,000) was the AHCT's. The responsibility for the maintenance of equipment was CCFC's. At the time of Administration the machinery was u/s. No maintenance had been carried out and no repairs made. Machinery had been used when faulty until it stopped working or had been rendered u/s through operator misuse. CCFC forwarded to me the quotation they had obtained from Farol's before there was any Administration. I used this as the amount needed for the works. I assumed, perhaps wrongly, that they had carried out a proper gathering of quotations and chosen the best option.
There were other things that needed to be agreed, but weren't, which perhaps could have been if there had been a will to do so.
At the time of Administration there were also some monies owed for usage over and above that agreed and pre-paid in the January to March period.
Holdings wanted to continue to run an Academy at the AHCT, they agreed to pay the money owed for the over-use. They would not agree to pay for the equipment repair. They would not agree to carry out the annual pitch refurbishment saying that they just wanted to use the AHC for the period to the end of the season. They would not enter into Agreements that would have given the Trustees the proper insurance protection. We had separately been told that we should provide replacement equipment as ours was u/s. I ignored this completely as I assumed then, as I do now, that nobody would expect anyone to take such a suggestion seriously. The result was that the Trustees would not allow Holdings to use the Centre but would allow Ltd to us it. The Administrator has acknowledged the debts but said that he had no Academy. Holdings wanted the debts to remain with Ltd, for us to buy or lease new equipment or pay for the repair to the equipment to allow them to use it for the period to the end of the season. They would not carry out the end-of-season refurbishment and would not give the Trustees the security of proper Agreements.
Some no doubt will say that the Trustees should have just shut up, bought new equipment for the Club and let the Academy continue and forget the insurance because there had never been any problems before. All I can say is that would have been unlawful and stupid.
As it is I do not think that it is the Trustees that have been stupid.
On 24 April Ms Seppala said that she would reply to a letter from our solicitors when she got back from travelling. On 20 June I invited her to reply and asked whether Mr Fisher would similarly be replying to our letter of early April saying that if they did not reply saying that they wanted to re-engage with the Trustees we would have to put into effect our plans for the future which would exclude the Academy. We have had no reply. Because we had had no reply since April to our earlier letters we put in a deadline. That deadline was passed on 25 June. After that time, to use someone else's words "we have moved on".
I have had a very close personal involvement in the Higgs Centre. I tried to express this earlier this year and, as could be expected, was the subject of abuse. The abuse doesn't hurt: what does is to see something that has and could continue to provide the Club with excellent facilities for an Academy be abandoned. I use the word Club because that is what I care about and what ALL the readers of this forum care about (whatever their views on who is right/wrong etc). I have said it before and I do not apologise for saying it again, the Club is not the company that owns it but the people who support it, who live with it and feel it a part of their lives as much as they do their brother, sister or cousin. Now the company and the owner have moved on and we are where we are.
