I can see the value of paying the LLW, as the club staff impacted by it are still quite lowly-paid and it seems a bit mean to restrict their pay, and if the club was profitable or supported by an owner who thought it was a “good cause” for him/her to subsidise the consequent higher losses then I certainly wouldn’t oppose it on principle, but it needs to be acknowledged as a political, rather than commercial, gesture and one which, as a club, we currently can’t actually afford (as we are running at a loss)

Trebor - you may well be right. I wouldn't mind betting that the Club will only offer contracts to firms who agree to sign up to the Living Wage Foundation - i.e: we might be preventing firms from the process of tendering for our business on this basis. A bit like we appear to be excluding potential shareholders who don't share the same "Values & Principals"!!

Nick - Well said. I totally agree. I'd go further and state that it's quite scandalous to expect fans to make donations which are then being used for this kind of "Socialist" nonsense.

Laurence asked the other day for us to provide an example of the club not being run in a commercial manner- I think that the payment of the London Living Wage is a prime example of this. It’s all very nice as a gesture, and if I was an employee getting more than the market rate for the job I would be very keen on it, but it’s certainly not what a commercial business would do

Micky Dolenz seems to have 2 heads 😁

When the club goes bust, it won't matter in the slightest what "minimum" wage they pay staff.

From memory, London Living Wage applies to people you contract with, too, so catering and bar staff? Working for a third party would fall within its scope?

Onto football matters and I feel like there’s a point available at Barnsley but we’re going to have to take it rather than be given it. We went a point above them in the table with the Reading win but they do have 2 games in hand on us. Of most concern (to me)is that only once in their last 7 home league games have they failed to score 2 or more goals - but they also don’t tend to keep clean sheets either.

OTD can't be real, since I don't see the Manager with his massive rosette and equally massive cigar in the background of the picture standing in his favourite spot. :o)

The guy in the crowd leaning on the wall by the drainpipe looks like Ron who always had had musketeer haircut and tash .

Bravery is not a shared principle or value

CW - it’s good to see Peter Beardsley doing a shift in goal though… 🧤

Someone on the DTB should be brave enough to put the motion. Most staff where I work can only dream of earning £29k. Principles are jolly nice - if you can afford them!

I think that was one thing that got modified from the original draft Trigger. It would be good to see what the latest version looks like though I guess we are just at the Yes/No stage by now.

Under the new constitution wouldn’t it also require 87 seconders?

DO - put forward a resolution to the next SGM along those lines. It would of course require a 67% vote, something the new constitution seems to include.

Principles, toeing the line

DT members should be asked "Should the club spunk £140k per year to pay the London Living Wage rather than the statutory minimum wage or retain this money to help stem the unsustainable annual losses that the club is making?"

Trigger - I don't know whether I share them because I don't know what they are. My Values & Principals would say ditch the commitment to the London Wage Foundation which will save us £140,000 or more next year and around £400,000 per annum after 3 years. That latter figure represents around 15% of our current losses and would go a long way to closing the gap.

Stuart - I'm not against the concept of fan ownership which is why I am one of the 5000 who between us own 5% of the Club. What I'm against is a Collective masquerading as fan ownership controlling and trampling on the interests of these 5000 owners.

The fans in the OTD pic look like zombies

That’s why we need far more detail on our finances than we get, JG. I would suggest full transparency on PLC Board member remuneration at the very least.

Whatever principles and values the current DTB have, I definitely do not share them.

I'm sure the NI increase cost the club a fair bit too!

I thought James Woodroof was both positive and impressive. He seems to have the Club moving in the right direction on a number of identifiable and measurable targets. Unfortunately, I suspect his hands are tied in relation to a number of matters (despite towing the line) – one of which is the voluntary enrolment to the London Wage Foundation – of which it is estimated less than 10% of private sector employers in London are signed up to. This requires the payment of a minimum wage significantly higher than that required by law. For the current year it has increased by 6.9%, more than double the rate of inflation and at a rate significantly higher than the average of fans (even triple locked pensioners!!) who are being asked to pay for it. James mentioned that this increase would cost the club an additional £140,000 this year – which is clearly a lot of money. It would seem that fans are simply being asked to donate to fund salary increases which are both unsustainable and at a much higher level than they themselves are benefitting from. Almost more worrying is that it beggars the question as to who all of these people are? For the increase to be £140,000, at a 6.9% increase, the overall pay of these employees must be over £2,000,000 (excluding NI & Pensions). On a full-time basis, the London Wage Foundation Wage is approximately £29,000. Are we really employing 67+ people whose salaries were previously below this level and if so what do they all do?