by Phil Thomas
There is a long term breakdown in communications between the Board of Cardiff Rugby Football Club (CRFC) Ltd and the Management Committee of the Cardiff Athletic Club (CAC). The most common form of communication is via letter, sometimes solicitor's letters. A major part of this is Peter Thomas' inability to own more of the company than do CAC as the M&AA state that no individual or group can own more than CAC. This means that Thomas cannot turn his loans into equity. There is also the issue that the other sections of CAC could benefit financially from any future sale of CAP, so it is in their interests to perpetuate this problem.
We believe that it would be prudent of the Board to employ a third party company - Deloitte, PWC etc (not Broomfield Alexendar, the auditors and corporate season ticket holders) - to independently investigate the value of any move in relation to remaining at CAP. It is claimed that the drivers for the move are commercial yet the people making these claims are the ones who have failed to grow the business at CAP.
Now that the Heads of Terms agreement has been signed, the Board should employ a third party company to audit the agreement.
The present management team have grown the business from its city centre location. Turnover figures have grown only because of extra money (which is Cardiff RFC Ltd's anyway) being re-invested by the WRU. We think that this is down to poor performance from the management team, not than because of limitations in the facilities available. The marketing push for CAP and the Cardiff Blues is poor.
A follow on from point 4 but it should be noted that the use of the ground on non-match days is pretty much limited to the car park rather than the other facilities involved. The free space around the back of the North Stand could be developed in partnership with third parties to ensure more income from this land.
Cardiff City have had at least two open meetings with supporters, yet the Board of Cardiff RFC Ltd feel that they can act with no interaction from the supporters. This is symptomatic of the arrogant nature towards supporters, as though we don't count and the business is the plaything of certain board members. We would like to remind the Board that Cardiff Rugby belongs to all of us, not just them. We feel supporters must be involved in the process.
It is the responsibility of the Management Committee of CAC to keep top flight rugby at CAP yet they have not fulfilled this duty as they support the move away of the Cardiff Blues. We feel that such an important issue should have been voted on by CAC members before the Management Committee reached such a decision.
We are seeking to change the Management Committee of CAC by calling an EGM to alter the structure of the board. So far the Management Committee have not fulfilled their duty in accepting this call and are stalling by writing to those signatories on the initial request. We feel that this is just a further indication of the committee not acting in the best interests of CAC members.
The annual rent is presently just £100,000 whilst the conservative estimate is that the ground earns £700,000 from the car park and match day events at MSCAP. The only reason the Premiership team will remain at CAP is so that CRFC Ltd can continue to make use of this income, but it must also be noted that rates and maintenance of CAP equates to a spend of approximately £400,000 pa. Whichever way you look at it, the revenue outweighs the expense so why sign up to a 20 year agreement that will cost a figure close to £500,000 a year? That is what CCFC have budgeted as income from rugby.
It is our view that a better relationship between CAC and CRFC Ltd would see CAP redeveloped for the benefit of both rugby teams. The land is there to utilise as a multi storey car park with land left over for business use facilities that would bring income to the rugby teams.