Dewsnip – Dewdiligence? – Don’t think so…

As we’ve mentioned many times before, there’s never a dull moment if you’re a supporter of Morecambe Football Club.

On the field, new owners Panjab Warriors are playing their part in a situation where a club that was a proud member of EFL League One just four years ago and had never been relegated are facing a third demotion since – this time to the obscurity of National League North at the end of this season. They did this by appointing the least well qualified Manager the club has ever had and persevering with him months after it became apparent to everyone else on the planet that he was completely out of his depth and absolutely the wrong man for the job.

Off the field, the Shrimps Trust has told us that they have had a meeting with one member of the Panjab Warriors this week. Yes, just one. But he assured them that the twelve key questions they posed to Chairman Kuljit Singh Momi some time ago were being worked on and would be answered at some time in an apparently unspecified future. Most of these questions are hardly worthy of Only Connect and – at the risk of being overly cynical – you have to wonder why it is taking them so long to come up with what should surely be some straightforward answers to a few of the questions at least: there is no reason that they should all be addressed at the same time.

But – according to the owners at least – there was something to celebrate this week. Morecambe Football Club has appointed another Clown to join the existing Circus. Sorry – to celebrate the appointment of a new Chief Operating Officer. All together now: Whoopee!

The lucky man is 58-year-old Stephen (“Call me Steve!”) Dewsnip, the former Commercial Director of Stalybridge Celtic FC. This is how his previous employers expressed their disappointment at losing such a key employee:

https://stalybridgeceltic.co.uk/news/nodataforDewsnip/Morecambe

Panjab Warriors have been slightly more effusive. This is how the elusive owners of Morecambe FC announced our very good fortune as loyal Shrimps supporters yesterday:

“Morecambe Football Club are delighted to announce the appointment of Steve Dewsnip as the club’s new Chief Operating Officer.

Steve joins us with extensive football and business experience and has held prominent roles with non-league clubs covering all aspects of off-field activity. He was recently Commercial Director at Stalybridge Celtic and prior to that Chief Operating Officer at Southport in the National League North, with responsibility for commercial and operational activities.
 
As COO, Steve will be responsible for overseeing the club’s day-to-day operations and staff, working across all operational areas of the club to ensure progress on and off the pitch towards its long-term sustainability. This will include commercial growth and partnerships, stadium operations and matchday delivery, as well as the overall supporter experience.
 
Steve, who has today started in his new role said: “As a proud Lancastrian, I am honoured and excited to be joining Morecambe as its Chief Operating Officer. A football club’s on and off-field activities are each vitally important to the success and sustainability of the other.”

“I am very much looking forward to working closely with the Board and ownership group, CEO Ropinder Singh, the staff, our commercial partners, supporters and local community to help support the club’s drive back to where it belongs on the football map.”
 
Morecambe FC Chairman Kuljit Singh Momi, said: “I am pleased to welcome Steve to the club and believe that his football experience, knowledge and proven track record will be an important addition to the club as we seek to strengthen our executive leadership team.”
 
Professionally, Steve retired from a 35-year career in banking and financial services, including 20 years with Rothschild in Manchester and the Channel Islands. He was also the Co-Founder and Chairman for six years of Guernsey FC, leading the first project to bring English national league system football to an offshore island and securing two successive promotions to step four, as well as reaching the semi-finals of the FA Vase.
 
Everyone at Morecambe FC would like to warmly welcome Steve and wish him every success in his new role.“

I know that it’s difficult to believe that Panjab Warriors might have actually got something wrong as far as their relationship with us mere mushrooms who actually turn-up to support the team is concerned. But the fact that not `everyone’ would like to warmly welcome this appointment was made abundantly clear in no time at all. In fact, the online backlash to this announcement has been so powerful on social media that the club was obliged to issue another statement at about 1400hrs on Friday, 20^th February 2026. This is it:

“Morecambe Football Club is aware of recent online discussion relating to historic media reports concerning a member of staff.

The Board of Directors wishes to make clear that the Club takes standards of conduct, safeguarding, and governance extremely seriously.

All appointments at Morecambe FC are made following appropriate due diligence, relevant checks, and established internal procedures, in line with the Club’s policies and regulatory requirements.

Our immediate priority remains restoring stability, strengthening the Club’s foundations, and providing continued support to our players, staff, and supporters as we work towards long-term sustainability both on and off the pitch.

We are committed to maintaining open and honest communication and will continue to engage constructively with supporters through our official channels.

The Club will not be making any further comment on this matter.“

So what’s all the fuss about then?

Shall we start with the manner in which Morecambe’s FC’s owners have chosen to portray Mr Dewsnip’s stellar career so far on the club’s website? This is what they said:

“Professionally, Steve retired from a 35-year career in banking and financial services, including 20 years with Rothschild in Manchester and the Channel Islands. He was also the Co-Founder and Chairman for six years of Guernsey FC, leading the first project to bring English national league system football to an offshore island and securing two successive promotions to step four, as well as reaching the semi-finals of the FA Vase.”

Is that really entirely true? Let’s look at this a little bit deeper, shall we? Did he actually `retire’ – or did he find himself in a situation where a `career in banking and financial services’ was actually effectively closed-off to him? That’s not quite the same thing, is it? Let’s start with the bit about huge Western Capitalist institution Rothschild:  a bank so powerful that a British government once promised its owner a lump of Palestine as a Jewish Homeland. And we all know how well that turned-out, don’t we? Anyway – financial trade journal International Adviser reported on 12 September 2016:

“A group of British expats have launched a lawsuit against NM Rothschild over a Spanish property investment, The Sunday Times has reported. Four pensioners have filed a High Court action against the investment bank, accusing it of mistreatment in a scheme which allowed them to take out mortgages worth up to 75% of the value of their Spanish homes… They claim that during an event by Henry Woods in October 2005, Stephen Dewsnip, a Rothschild employee at the time, gave a presentation about a scheme he said “would save participants a fortune in Spanish inheritance tax as well as providing them with a modest income”. Dewsnip is one of the former directors of the collapsed Guernsey-based Providence Investments Funds whose parent company, Providence Global Ltd, is affiliated with Miami-based Providence Financial Investments which recently came under fire from US authorities for defrauding investors out of $64m. According to documents seen by the Sunday Times newspaper, the aggrieved investors accuse Rothschild of abusing its position as a “highly respected bank” and profiteering by taking advantage of retired people with little or no relevant investment experience.”

The  Equity  Release  Victims  Association adds:

“A crew from France2 television were present at (a subsequent legal hearing) and interviewed some of the victims. They were unsuccessful in getting any responses from Rothschild’s unfriendly lawyers who do not forgive the audacious ‘ambush’ on Mr. Steve Dewsnip who, in spite of being sought after by a Criminal Court in Denia, had managed to stay ‘at large’ for years, even travelling freely to Spain to assist Rothschild in their cases against victims.”

And if this wasn’t damning enough on its own, another specialist financial website explains why Mr Dewsnip’s `retirement’ from financial services wasn’t entirely his own choice:

“Guernsey regulator bans Steve Dewsnip from financial services industry

October 27, 2024

British businessman Steve Dewsnip, 57, whose involvement in several fraudulent investment schemes has been previously exposed by OffshoreAlert, has been banned from Guernsey’s regulated financial services industry.”

Oh dear: terms like “involvement in several fraudulent investment schemes” would be libellous – if they weren’t true. So what was that reference to a `collapsed Guernsey-based Providence Investments Fund’ above? BBC News told us the following during November 2024:

“One of the co-founders of Guernsey FC has been banned by the island’s financial regulator from any involvement in regulated companies, following his involvement in a fraudulent investment fund which collapsed in 2016.

The club’s former chairman Steve Dewsnip, 57, who is now commercial director of Northern Premier League side Stalybridge Celtic, was banned by the Guernsey Financial Services Commission (GFSC) for “failure to meet the minimum criteria for licensing”.

The ban means Mr Dewsnip will not be able to perform any function for Guernsey-based regulated companies such as investment funds, insurance firms or banks – but is not prevented from performing his current role.”

Previously – on 27 July 2020 – the aforementioned GFSC imposed a financial penalty of £7,000 under section 11D of the Financial Services Commission Law on Mr Dewsnip, presumably partly as a warning shot concerning his future behaviour on the Channel Islands. To no avail: four years later, he was banned from working on the territory altogether.

So are there any other skeletons in this gentleman’s closet? Surely not. But wait… What’s this? The Equity Release Victims Association’s website also tells us:

“Steve Dewsnip, who once dedicated to his professional life to sign up over one hundred property-grabbing Rothschild Credit Select Series Mortgage Loans, is now being tried for bum-grabbing.”

The International Adviser of 17^th November 2016 tells us more:

“Steve Dewsnip, one of the former directors of the collapsed Guernsey-based Providence Investments Funds, has appeared in court in London accused of sexual assault. The 49-year-old allegedly fondled a young waitress’s bottom in an exclusive Wembley Stadium suite after an England football match, Harrow crown court heard on Thursday reported The Evening Standard. Dewsnip, of Castel, Guernsey, pulled the woman towards him, put one arm around her and groped her as she collected glasses following the match in September last year, the jury was told.

“He reached an arm out behind me, pulled me towards him and fondled my bum. He pulled me right up next to him and continued with the conversation and did not acknowledge what was happening. I felt unable to protest. I was working and we have to be polite and I tried not to make contact with him. It’s very hard to know how to react,” the alleged victim, a full-time student from London, told the jury.

Dewsnip, the founder and ex-chairman of Guernsey FC, was arrested when he returned to the same suite for an England v France friendly international a month later. He pleaded not guilty and denied the allegation, adding that he had no recollection of touching anyone’s bottom, even accidentally.”

It’s important to acknowledge that Mr Dewsnip was subsequently acquitted of this offence.

Without casting any further aspersions though, you do have to wonder why a young woman would put herself through the considerable ordeal of having to stand up in Court and re-live what for her at least would be a very traumatic experience such as this if there was no truth in it. I don’t think we have to look much further than a certain Andrew somebody-or-other who is in the news at the moment to understand why a very particular type of man thinks it’s ok to do things like this…

Anyway – with the breath of scandal concerning links between a former Director of Communications at Morecambe FC and a `terrorist’ group in the Punjab still swirling around – it’s reassuring to see that the Panjab Warriors have clearly chosen the best man for the job whose spotless past is clearly of no concern at all to the future reputation of our club. It’s also really good to see that they are open to discussing the outrage their latest brainless appointment has created in the open and constructive way they always do: “The club will not be making any further comment on this matter.” Maybe they could invite Jason Whittingham back at the same time as Director of Ethical Values to underline the highest standards of honesty, transparency, integrity and probity which our new owners – who obviously aren’t at all dodgy themselves in any way – are clearly so eager to portray.

So – all together again: “Whoopee!” A warm welcome to the Circus, Mr DewDiligence.

It looks like you’re the perfect fit…