The relationship had waned before FC100000.
I remember the Iron Trust AGM in which the Whole board attended ,the one before last.
Michelle Harness was asked a direct question about the shares set aside for sales and when it would begin ,I cannot remember the exact wording of the question but Michell’s answer was most telling, there was no actual stock of shares owned by the club for such events and any such sales would come from her personal holding. At the time I found that at odds with what had become the party line and common knowledge that there was this stock of shares available and money from it’s would go directly into the club, perfect for a trust and it’s stated aims. I won’t be trawling through the net for corroboration but this is how I remember the narrative and nobody from the club ever dismissed the idea .
After that night the club also contacted the trust to complain about releasing verbatim minutes of the evening, something I also felt to be odd.
After this came the FC100000 debacle which further divided the relationship.
The next blow to the trust was somewhat self inflicted, the tie up with merch labs after their much publicised and somewhat acrimonious dismissal from GP led to sanctions and legal threats about Using the Unity crest on merch despite the profits being intended to make their way back to SUFC. I did contact the new club shop franchise owners and the denied knowledge of any such threat so this was entirely from within SUFC and petty. The great Irony being the club didn’t even design the much used crest ,a member of the trust actually commissioned it during the Don Rowing era. Not only did they ban them from using that crest they also banned them from selling other merch at trust corner, other supporter groups have no such restrictions. This is clearly personal .
The next slap in the face was the trust’s share save scheme which despite a very lukewarm rection from the club still raised a fair wedge ,not sure where that money went .The club wanted nothing to do with it and in my opinion were shamed into going along with it as they couldn’t explain why there would be shares for FC1000000 and where they would come from, they have never explained.
