Mebe Qael Re Introduction 3 Shares 4 Projects 4 Admin/IT 5 Club Engagement 6 External Fundraising 9 Campaigns 10 Communications 14 INTRODUCTION

Following the recent board elections is returning to providing quarterly updates to members. This follows a period during which we trialled various alternative means of communicating with members and monitored feedback on which approach was preferred. Since it has been some time since the last quarterly update was issued this update will cover a longer period. The next update will be in June 2020. These updates will be in addition to regular communication with members on matters of interest, project polls, share polls, member experiences and Club 1872 statements.

The work with the CIC Regulator took up a huge amount of our volunteer board’s time over the period since the last update. It involved substantial governance and legal work as well as dealing with complaints made to the Regulator. Unfortunately these included several complaints by a small group of Rangers supporters who have also been very vocal in their opposition to Club 1872 on social media.

The result of this extensive piece of work is that the organisation has a robust, transparent constitution in place and has developed an excellent working relationship with the CIC Regulator who has been very patient and supportive of the board’s efforts throughout the process. We thank her for that. Every aspect of the organisation has been examined, with the assistance of the Regulator, in what has been a very valuable exercise for both Club 1872 and our board members personally. We anticipate that the work done over the past year will now also make it much easier for Club 1872 to deal quickly and definitively with further complaints from the same individuals should they occur. Now that this work is complete, the Club 1872 board sees 2020 as a year where the organisation will be able to focus much more time on membership growth, campaigns and fund raising.

We are delighted to welcome Alan Fraser to the board following the recent election. We are also very pleased to retain the hard work and experience of Laura Fawkes and Reverend Stuart MacQuarrie. SHARES

Since our last update, Club 1872 has invested £1.5 million into Rangers International Football Club PLC through the purchase of shares. Despite very significant investment from other major, individual shareholders, Club 1872 has maintained its status as a major shareholder and is currently the fifth largest shareholder in RIFC. We continue to purchase smaller numbers of shares as and when they become available to us. Growing our shareholding in RIFC remains the main focus of Club 1872 Shares CIC.

Once the current work on our website is complete we will be launching a campaign to increase our membership and grow the Club 1872 shareholding in RIFC.

We have had great support from our members and the wider Rangers community over the period. ORSA and NARSA have both been supportive of Club 1872 and ORSA generously donated £850 to us for our share campaign in 2019. More detail here - https://club1872.co.uk/news/538972-orsa/

PROJECTS

Since our last update, Club 1872 has funded four projects for the benefit of the Rangers community. In 2018 and 2019, Club 1872 supported the Rangers Charity Foundation in its provision of a year-long Walking Football programme to members of the Rangers family. The first Walking Football programme was launched by Derek Johnstone, and we were delighted to renew our funding for the project the following year. https://www.rangerscharity.org.uk/in-the-community/community-programmes/health- wellbeing/walking-football https://club1872.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Scan0149.pdf

In October 2019, Club 1872 members voted for the Club 1872 Projects CIC to support the Rangers Charity Foundation Dream Day Fund, which is used to pay for special Rangers experiences throughout the season for children and adults whose lives have been impacted by the likes of disability, illness or other difficult circumstances. Our Dream Day Fund project funded two Dream Days at the and the 2019 Dream Fund Kids' Christmas Party. https://www.rangerscharity.org.uk/news/watch-tav-joins-kids-at-christmas-party

In November 2019, Club 1872 members voted to approve a major shares purchase as a project, which allowed us to invest £500,000 into Rangers International Football Club. Members also approved a project to support the Women & Girls Football Department at Rangers Football Club through creating memorable matchday experiences for the Rangers community. This project will be delivered in the coming months. ADMIN/IT

Website

Work is continuing on the new Club 1872 website and subscription system. We had hoped this would be in place in February but some final development and testing work is still ongoing. We hope that members will see a significant improvement in account management and navigation in the new site to enable them to interact more easily with Club 1872.

Membership Retention/Card Expiry

Membership has remained steady around the 7000 mark in the period since the last update. A major challenge still facing the organisation is membership retention, particularly in relation to the expiry of credit cards which leads to memberships lapsing. We expect the new website subscription system to assist in this regard but we would also ask that members check their Club 1872 emails carefully and regularly as we always email members to inform them of expired cards. We will be focussing on guiding new members to Direct Debit signup once the new website launches and hope this will improve retention levels.

We continue to attract new members on a regular basis but we also lose members, overwhelmingly due to card expiry. If we can improve retention of existing members then membership would be on a steady growth curve. There will be a major campaign focus, in 2020 and beyond, to increase our membership base and replenish funds for both the continued purchase of shares and, we hope, larger projects. As always we would ask members to help us in this regard by encouraging friends, family and work colleagues to join Club 1872.

Matchday Activity

Our matchday volunteers continue to hand out leaflets regularly before games in an effort to increase membership, and we thank them for their help. We are planning to update our literature in the near future and matchday engagement will be something we try to increase with members’ support. We will be emailing members to ask for volunteers for this when our new membership campaign launches following the new website being in place.

Our board members are also regularly in our office in Copland House prior to games to meet and discuss issues with members who drop in. CLUB ENGAGEMENT

Meetings with Senior staff

Club 1872 continues to meet regularly with the Rangers Chairman, Managing Director and Supporter’s Liaison Officer to address and discuss all matters of interest to the Rangers support. We make strong and frequent representations to the club on such matters. Those discussions will not always be made public but they always take place and it is Club 1872’s priority to effect real and meaningful change on behalf of supporters through our influence as major shareholders. For more details on specific issues we have raised with the club, please see the campaigns section as these matters are among those we address directly with the club.

Since our last update, a particular focus of our meetings with the club has been on how the club communicates with supporters and its relationship with both print and broadcast media in Scotland. As we laid out in our last statement on the Scottish media treatment of Alfredo Morelos, we believe that a fresh approach to the relationship between the club and the media in Scotland is required. The access granted to these media outlets is a valuable commodity and as such it should be justifiable from both a commercial and reputational point of view. On that basis we made representations to the club about providing the same access for supporter led, new media.

We are also pleased to report that as a direct result of our discussions with the club on improving fan engagement, we have been able to provide formal responses from the club to supporters on issues such as the ongoing dispute with BBC Scotland (further details and link below in Campaigns section) and on safety issues at Rugby Park:

Community Forum

Club 1872 Director, Euan Macfarlane continues to attend meetings of the Rangers Community Forum to learn about how the club is supporting the local community and support those activities however we can. This has been a valuable exercise and is something we will continue. Relations with the communities around Ibrox are important and continue to improve following issues with objections to the Ibrox fanzone which have been well documented.

Feedback Sessions

Club 1872 has been able to organise a number of feedback sessions through the Rangers SLO for Club 1872 members to provide feedback directly to Rangers on a number of issues. We hope to make these a more regular occurrence and we are in dialogue with the SLO regarding this.

Fan Safety and Security

Club 1872 has a regular meeting in place with Police Scotland to raise any issues of fan safety at home and away games.

We have raised a number of issues directly with Police Scotland and club staff following feedback from supporters - the most serious of these being the issues at Rugby Park in the first game of the season. We issued public comment on this - http:// createsend.com/t/d-6F47BFA7F92E644C2540EF23F30FEDED

We have also provided feedback to the club following members’ emails regarding European away ties in the successful Europa League campaign. Any members who wish to raise issues should email [email protected].

Everyone Anyone

Club 1872 has been proud to support Rangers’ Everyone Anyone campaign. Club 1872 Directors Laura Fawkes, Euan Macfarlane and Stuart MacQuarrie have all taken part in promotional events over the period since the launch of this campaign, which has had a positive reaction from both Rangers supporters and external parties. We continue to do anything we can, working with Rangers and other groups, to promote a positive but undiluted atmosphere at Ibrox. Great strides have been made in this area over the past 12 months and that work will continue. Football Department Sponsorship

Club 1872 has been extremely pleased with the progress we’ve made in recent months in developing a strong, positive relationship with the Commercial Department at Rangers. We have held a series of meetings with Commercial Director, James Bisgrove and his team to discuss how we can work together to ensure supporters’ views and input are a key consideration in how the club promotes itself and its activities, looking at various issues including branding, membership scheme and the growth of women and girls football.

As a result of this developing relationship we agreed a unique new partnership with Rangers, making us the official partner of the Football Department. This partnership will provide Club 1872 members with unique access to Rangers’ first-team, Academy and Women’s coaching and technical staff throughout the season.

During the course of this season, Club 1872 will hold Q&A events with key members of the Football Department, led by Sporting Director Ross Wilson. This will include Q&As with Women and Girl’s Football Manager Amy McDonald and Women’s Head Coaches Gregory Vignal and Malky Thomson, to hear more about Rangers’ efforts to grow and develop Women’s football within the club.

The partnership will allow Club 1872 to benefit from branding opportunities at and the Rangers Training Centre. EXTERNAL FUNDRAISING

Club 1872 has assisted various supporters groups and organisations in their efforts to raise funds for charities and good causes to benefit the Rangers community. These include

Poppy Scotland – Club 1872 took The 1918 Poppy Pledge, raising £2000 to support the Armed Forces community living in Scotland today.

Willie Waddell Memorial – we supported the Willie Waddell Memorial Committee in reaching their fundraising target to rename a Lanarkshire sports centre and erect monoliths in tribute to Willie Waddell. http://createsend.com/t/d-D0D74FAD1C131DE42540EF23F30FEDED

Ibrox area defibrillator – we supported the family of Peter Derrick in their campaign to install defibrillators at various points between the Viceroy Bar and Ibrox Stadium. http://createsend.com/t/d-4A23EEDA03593AB12540EF23F30FEDED CAMPAIGNS

Parking Restrictions at Ibrox

In line with our members’ vote in 2017, Club 1872 has attended one public engagement session and made two submissions to City Council to raise concerns about the proposed match day parking restrictions and to register our organisational objection to the proposals. Club 1872 has continued to liaise with Rangers and supporters since then, and will attend both the pre-hearing meeting and the public hearing organised by GCC to present our concerns and objections. We will update members on these events, and on any further communication with GCC on this matter.

BBC Scotland

Club 1872 members will be aware of the club’s long-standing dispute with BBC Scotland. Since our last general update, we have issued four statements/updates specific to BBC Scotland and our correspondence with them on their refusal to cover games at Ibrox and interview Rangers players/staff. We have also made a number of complaints to BBC Scotland regarding what we consider to be biased, inaccurate and offensive output, and have updated members on these complaints via email and social media.

We were also pleased to present to members an interview with James Traynor on the club’s interactions with BBC Scotland. You can view the interview here - https:// youtu.be/4IhlZ6aLgTQ

In case you missed them, you can catch up on our updates on BBC Scotland here: http://createsend.com/t/d-59E4AD84F03E24732540EF23F30FEDED http://createsend.com/t/d-0EAA06F44DB29B072540EF23F30FEDED https://twitter.com/Club1872rfc/status/1158801408591847425?s=20 http://createsend.com/t/d-7E4DEB311B0878032540EF23F30FEDED http://createsend.com/t/d-C73594627C172B772540EF23F30FEDED http://createsend.com/t/d-CA81D6894E1ECDEC2540EF23F30FEDED

It is absolutely clear from the responses we’ve had that BBC Scotland will use any excuse and perform mental gymnastics to the point of absurdity to try to justify instances of biased or inaccurate coverage. On the one occasion where they acknowledged a breach by Tom English, no apology was issued, it took 5 months for the decision to be published on the BBC website and the offending tweet was not removed. In common with the recent Michael Stewart incident, where he made offensive comments regarding racism and defamatory comments regarding Jim Traynor, the BBC only saw to fit to “remind” their staff about their responsibilities - a reminder which appears to be repeated frequently and continually ignored by BBC Scotland Sport. Regardless, we will continue to challenge them where necessary and have escalated a number of our complaints directly to senior management level or through the full BBC complaints process.

We are currently putting together a submission to the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport in order to take the matter further, and as per our media guidance to supporters we would also encourage individuals to write polite complaints to BBC Scotland and to email their own constituency MPs and MSPs regarding their disgraceful coverage of Rangers.

Media Coverage

Outside of issues with BBC Scotland, Club 1872 also submitted a number of IPSO complaints over the period regarding false or inaccurate reporting on Rangers and Rangers supporters in the Scottish press. This is an ongoing issue which we challenge where we can within the limited resources we have.

We expect to have news for members soon on one of those IPSO complaints in particular, which has been ongoing for over 10 months. It is often the case that IPSO complaints take a very long time or are unable to progress due to technical reasons, with newspapers regularly employing lawyers to challenge complaints made about them. However, we have historically been successful in having complaints upheld and expect further success given the regular nature of inaccurate reporting. Complaints can only be raised for factual inaccuracy so it is not always possible to challenge everything we would like to but we always challenge what we can.

We were successful in securing a public apology from James Dornan MSP for a false accusation against Club 1872. You can view more detail on this here - https:// club1872.co.uk/news/james-dornan-msp-apologises-to-club-1872/

We have issued detailed media guidance for members and wider support including alternatives to mainstream media where supporters can often find significantly more accurate information.

You can view the guidance for challenging the media here - https://club1872.co.uk/ news/media-guidance-for-supporters/

You can view media alternatives here - https://club1872.co.uk/news/traditional-media- alternatives-for-supporters/

More recently we have also spoken to Rangers about securing access for fan media to attend club press conferences. This has now been approved and we expect it to commence soon. We will continue to speak to the club and encourage them to engage with reputable alternative media outlets who are willing to criticise constructively and report fairly on Rangers.

SFA Disciplinary Process

Club 1872 would like to take this opportunity to update members on our dialogue, or lack of it, with the SFA over the past 18 months. In 2019 we wrote to the SFA six times including emails to Ian Maxwell and the Compliance Officer, Claire Whyte. As yet we have not received a single response. This correspondence was in relation to the shambolic disciplinary system put in place by the SFA and the incompetent handling of that system both before and after Ms Whyte took up her position. There are also serious concerns about the standard of refereeing in Scotland and the negative effect this has had on the integrity of the league and cup competitions. We would have preferred to engage with the SFA directly but it is now clear they have no interest in proper dialogue with Scottish football supporters.

The recent decision by the SFA that Rod Petrie, Mike Mulraney and Ian Maxwell should effectively overrule a decision of one of their independent disciplinary panels regarding James Keatings, is the latest in a long line of shambolic outcomes to emerge from this process. It also casts further doubt on the integrity of previous decisions, many of which involved Rangers.

The reasoning given by the SFA for stepping in to overrule this panel is even less credible than the decision itself and makes a mockery of their failure to act in previous cases.

Rangers Managing Director Stewart Robertson said recently that Rangers believe there are “severe flaws in the disciplinary system” and other clubs have since spoken out publicly about these problems. We welcome Rangers being at the forefront of demanding an overhaul of this disastrous disciplinary process. It needs to be torn up and rewritten and those responsible for its creation cannot be involved again. The current compliance officer is clearly not fit for purpose but neither are those who drafted these rules and processes in the first place.

We hope the SFA will belatedly show some leadership and implement a proper disciplinary system, overseen by accountable people with some common sense and drafted by a legal team with the competence to do a good job.

Glasgow City Councillors

Members will recall the serious concerns raised by Club 1872 and others over the denial of a fanzone at Ibrox by Glasgow City Council. This led to Club 1872 making a complaint to the Commissioner for Ethical Standards in Public Life over the behaviour of Councillors Susan Aitken, David MacDonald and Stephen Dornan. We were consistently informed by the Commissioner that this process and outcome should be kept strictly confidential but, following the outcome of the investigation, Councillors Aitken and MacDonald saw fit to break that confidentiality.

We have included a graphic below, circulated by Councillor MacDonald on social media and covered in the Scottish press, which lays out their position on the matter.

The letter we received from the Commissioner detailing the outcome of the complaint is unrecognisable from the language used by these Councillors to describe it. For the record, the claim that complaints were “fabricated” is completely false. There was email evidence of interference in the licensing process, obtained from Glasgow City Council under FoI, and this was part of the complaint. It is also completely false to claim that the Commissioner found that there was “no basis” for the complaint. In fact the Commissioner found that “on balance there was insufficient evidence” to show that the Community Council had been misled. They found that “on balance it was likely” that Glasgow Life had made the decision to withdraw support for the fanzone themselves and that the contemporaneous email evidence submitted to the Commissioner showing that Councillors Aitken and MacDonald had interfered was a “genuine misunderstanding between Glasgow Life officers”.

We respect, but do not agree with, the Commissioner’s decision which has been made on the balance of probabilities, and giving what we believe is undue weight to the explanation submitted by the Council after the events in question. Club 1872 was also severely restricted in our ability to draft the complaint by Glasgow City Council’s refusal to provide un-redacted versions of correspondence which included Councillors discussing how they could stop the fanzone from being accepted.

We are extremely concerned at the complete disregard from both Councillors Aitken and MacDonald for the confidentiality required under the relevant legislation. As a result, and following dialogue with the Commissioner’s staff we have now submitted a new complaint regarding this breach of confidentiality.

Club 1872 will respect the confidentiality of the complaints process unless it is breached once again by any other party. COMMUNICATIONS

In the period since our last update our comms team replied to 1655 emails from members, covering a variety of topics. This constant dialogue with members and other supporters allows us to assess which issues are of importance to them, and which should be fed back to the club and/or taken forward as Club 1872 campaigns.

We welcome feedback from members on all aspects of the organisation. Email gives us greater freedom to communicate fully with members than social media platforms where detailed conversations can quickly become unmanageable for our social media volunteers. Having said that, our social media accounts are active in communicating with members and the wider support on major issues.

We have gained around 12,000 new Twitter followers in the period, taking us to 77,000. We have 38,874 “Likes” on Facebook. On campaign issues, we are reaching more people than ever. Our two statements on the racist abuse of Alfredo Morelos and the subsequent press treatment of the issue reached 133,431 and 154,206 people on Twitter and 93,081 and 71,791 on Facebook. We continue to try to grow our social media channels as the quickest and most effective way of reaching potential new members.

We have also sent over 123 mass emails to members on a variety of subjects, including experiences, campaign updates, projects (polls and updates), share purchase, retail deal, constitution proposals and events.

Our comms group provides ongoing feedback to the Club 1872 board on social media and admin stats, and continues to monitor and assess the best ways to reach out to members.

This update is issued by Supporters Voice Limited a Club 1872 company.