Sign the damn’ Paperwork!

Morecambe’s Labour MP – Lizzi Collinge – addressed a sparsely-populated House of Commons yesterday, Tuesday 8^th July 2025. Clad in a suitably-coloured red dress (as far as her local football club, not her Party is concerned), she was actually talking about the Football Governance Bill which is going through parliament currently. But she gave a concrete example of why – in her view – such a Bill needs to become an Act as soon as possible – and she gave our club as a case in point:

“I had hoped to come to the House today with a spring in my step as we’ve seen the sale of Morecambe FC go through. For this past week or so, instead, Morecambe FC and our town have been put through hell. And we still can’t see the end of it.

Over ten days ago, the EFL approved a buyer – the Panjab Warriors – they’re ready; they’re willing to buy. Clearance has been granted. Over fourteen months, significant funds have been already pumped into the football club by the new buyers. The current owner, Jason Whittingham, operating as the Bond Group – said he was ready to sell.

But instead of getting the deal done, Jason Whittingham has, for whatever reason, stalled. He’s delayed; he’s given excuses; he tried to dismiss the Board. In fact, it’s only through the good intentions of the local Board members and the responsibility they feel towards Morecambe that saw their return to try and facilitate the sale, But yet again, Jason stalled. So now the Board have gone – again.

The Panjab Warriors have already poured-in lots of money to the club. They’ve made it clear: everything’s ready from their end. But still the sale has not been completed.

Most distressingly, staff and players have not been paid their full wages. I’ve been receiving e-mails from constituents who work for the club and are desperately worried about how they are going to pay their bills. Our local Citizens’ Advice and Food Bank have had to step-in – because that’s what we do in Morecambe – we look after our own.

And tomorrow, the club is due to pay £45,000 in V.A.T. Unless a sale goes through, there is no way the club can meet this obligation.

Until now, I have restrained myself from using the full extent of parliamentary privilege in this matter because my focus has been (on) getting this sale done. I held my tongue while the EFL went through their Due Diligence process.; I’ve implored Jason Whittingham directly to just get on with the sale. But this restraint has not produced the progress that I hoped to see.

So I now feel duty-bound to use this privilege to lay out what I see because what I suspect is that Jason Whittingham has built a House of Cards and now it’s falling down around his ears. There’s mention of further unspecified investors even at this final stage.

There’s a suspicion that the club is being used to leverage his own personal financial situation.  Morecambe FC is being held hostage and it breaks my heart.

Morecambe FC is the cornerstone of our community and what’s happening in Morecambe shows exactly why this Bill is needed. Jason Whittingham – and the likes of him – should never have been allowed to buy a football club.

Last week, the Secretary of State answered a question in this House about the sale and I’d like to thank her and the Sports Minister for all their support behind the scenes in dealing with this unfolding disaster.

This Labour government has stood by my community and frankly, I am baffled that the Conservatives are opposing this Bill. I know what a football club means to a town like Morecambe. This Bill is a crucial step to stopping other towns like Morecambe going through this heartache.

So I’m urging Members across the House to please support this Bill. And I say to Jason: “Come on – sign the damn’ paperwork!””

Lisa Nandy – the Secretary of State (for Sport, Culture and Media) who Lizzi referenced in her speech – replied to this statement to say that she was proud to have met the Shrimps and wanted everyone to know `that this government takes a very, very dim view of owners who treat our clubs as playthings – rather than the custodians that they are.”

Even without Conservative support, the Bill will almost certainly become law. But that will be some time in the future. Our club needs the support of the government now. Warm words alone won’t save our club and by the time the legislation is passed, Morecambe Football Club could very well no longer exist.

As we have seen, detested Morecambe owner Mr Whittingham has proved to be totally unreliable as far as repeated promises to sign the club over to Panjab Warriors is concerned.

Last Friday, he publicly swore to do the deal on Monday. On Monday, he solemnly promised to finish the paperwork on Tuesday. But when the time came, he again failed to do so and also – apparently – decided to maintain radio silence about this. One of the results was yet another in a long line of statements from the Shrimps Trust,  bemoaning the lack of any sort of positive action from the slippery owner of our club:

Shrimps Trust statement 8th July 2025   It is with growing frustration that we report there has been no progress since our update on 7th July. Jason Whittingham remains uncommunicative, with both the Shrimps Trust and, we understand, Panjab Warriors.   There is still no credible justification for the continued delay in the sale of Morecambe FC. Reports that he has suggested the existence of a new buyer to the National League are, in our view, highly questionable. We have seen no evidence of this.   Meanwhile, staff continue to be left without full pay, now approaching two weeks overdue. This is unacceptable, and it is deeply unfair to those who have shown commitment and loyalty to the club through increasingly difficult circumstances.   Earlier today, Lisa Nandy stated that the government takes “a very, very dim view” of owners like those at Bond Group. We echo that sentiment. Owners who operate with disregard for their responsibilities and the well-being of others have no place in football, or our community.   We are calling, again, for urgent intervention from the government and football authorities. Morecambe FC cannot be left to suffer under inadequate oversight and an ownership that has shown no accountability.   Our club, our staff, and our supporters deserve far better. The time for words has passed, what’s needed now is action.

Sadly, though, Mr Whittingham knows that he doesn’t have to do anything and – given that he is clearly totally unmoved by the moral imperative to end a situation where countless other people are not being paid because of his failure to come up with the funds – I no longer see any reason why he might.

One of the problems of being outside the loop of the negotiations which have been going on between Jason Whittingham and the Board at Morecambe, the Shrimps Trust, The EFL and the National League is that I have had to effectively guess what has been happening. With no inside knowledge, all I have been able to do is make sense of what seems to have occurred  because I don’t have anyone on the inside actually telling me. So in guessing, I have inevitably got some things wrong. Last night at Longridge – as Morecambe were playing what could conceivably be their last ever game – I got talking to one of my Shrimps pals who has more of a finger on the pulse of what has actually been happening behind the scenes this week as far as the sale of the club is concerned. And learned that an assumption I have made about the current situation is completely mistaken. I wrote in my last article – in trying to explain why it makes sense for the lovely Jason to cash in his chips now whist he’s still got any: If he sells the club, he will receive a substantial amount of money: millions of pounds. Depressingly though, it turns that that this isn’t true: he’s already received the £3.8 million I thought was lying in wait for him as a golden handshake. So there is no carrot to dangle to a man who clearly doesn’t care about the predicament he has put our wonderful club and its staff and players in.

Today – as Lizzi Collinge told her colleagues in the Commons – is a really critical one in the history of our club. Morecambe FC has to pay forty-five grand to the HMRC alone in VAT charges. In the current situation, it won’t be able to. And we all know that the HMRC doesn’t take any prisoners. From past experience – as the football authorities slap another embargo on us – they will apply to the High Court for a Winding-Up Order for the club. And as things stand at the moment, that will be the final straw: after 105 eventful years, the Shrimps will be no more.

It’s an appalling prospect. But what is even more appalling is that it will be the fault of just one selfish individual with an apparently sociopathic personality (which can be defined as ` a disregard for social norms, deceitfulness, impulsivity, aggression, a lack of empathy, irresponsibility and a total lack of remorse’). As our MP and other parliamentarians loudly signal their displeasure, nobody – not the National League, certainly not the HMRC (who apply the rules regardless of extenuating circumstances for fear of creating a precedent which others might follow) and no lawyer anywhere will do anything about it. Because however despicable his behaviour is, our pet Essex businessman has not broken the law. He will get away with it, effectively.

And those organisations who have sat by and allowed him to – and I’m thinking specifically about the English Football League here because they sanctioned his original grip on our club by accepting that he was a `fit and proper person’ even after he had single-handedly wrecked Worcester Warriors Rugby Union club– will keep shtum about it. Shame on them:  just like rogue owners at Macclesfield; Bury; Darlington and countless others before us have been allowed by them to wreck those clubs, their management of our Beautiful Game stinks.

So the sooner a Football Governance Act with actual teeth comes into force, the better.

Today is a pivotal day for our precious club – for all the reasons explained to parliament by our MP. So will our rogue owner take her advice and sign the damn’ paperwork?

The National League fixtures are due out later today. Will we be in a position to fulfil them?

We shall all have to wait and see…