Peter Marr.
“We took legal and professional advice on Alan Kernaghan's contract and within his contract we had the right to give him a notice, and the notice was the same as the rest of the senior staff at Dens, which is one month and we gave him one month. Although we had offered him a compromise of more than that, which was two month plus the month he had worked, plus the bonus he was due and he refused to take it. Billy Kirkwood took it and he was taking the same advice as Alan but I feel we have been slaughtered in the media by people who do not know what was in Alan Kernaghan's contract.
The contract was the same as the other senior staff at Dens Park and we pay them every penny that we feel we're due. If we're proved wrong in court eventually we'll have to face up to that. Alan signed that contract, Alan signed, had the contract looked over before he signed it and Alan signed it. Right to the very last minute I offered him compromise which would have gave him a lot more money than he'll get, and it wasn't five grand, it was a lot more than 5 grand. At the end of the day Alan decided not to take it and we have people, media reporters, screaming at us saying that we welched on the deal, you said there earlier on that we didn't, but we played it exactly by the book and we think we've done the proper thing and looked after the club at the same time by paying out the amount of money we needed to pay out.
At the Bank of Scotland put us into administration last time and we went in there and we worked hard to get the club out of administration and unfortunately because we were relegated, which still rankles wi me, because I feel we, we were hard done by there the club is struggling again and the fans are quite rightly are annoyed at things.”
JS – “Why did u sack Alan Kernaghan and Billy Kirkwood?”
Because of the results Jim, I mean he took over and he's had a hard time and I thought things could have picked up, but after the display against Brechin it was untenable. We were worried about season tickets for next year because that's the lifeblood of the club.
Part 2
We're working well within our banking facilities. I mean there was some high browed reporter, that was actually saying we can't get credit in Dundee, that is total nonsense. We can get as much credit as we need, we try and keep the credit down after the last time and make sure that everybody's paid. But no, just people, that, that, that spread rumours about us. We are working within our backing facilities, but we as directors of a public company have got duties and we, we have to make sure that we can see for the future what's going on. We will be meeting with the bank to decide on the support that we need and hopefully the bank can support us for that…”
JS – “When will that be?”
Well, soon I hope because we've got, we've got, we've got decisions that have got to be made, we need to appoint a manager, we've got to put season tickets out Jim, now if we weren't sure we could last a whole season then we cannae really take season ticket money fae people. We got through the last time, season tickets holders didnae suffer the last time, so I would say that this time what we've gotta do is make sure we have the support that we can see till the end of the season, or even further than that Jim, then we can go about our business and do our business. The only way we can do that is to speak to our major creditor, which is the bank.”
JS – “There were suggestions this week, this Wednesday in fact that you'd meet with Fraser Wishart of the SPFA and half a dozen of your top earners and ask them to take some fairly dramatic cuts. Those cuts have been rumoured to be as much as 40%. What happens if those players don't take the cuts?”
“Well, the point Jim is that, yes we, we will have to speak to players and we will have to ask players to look at their position in the club and, but the players have the option as well Jim, if they can' accept the cuts then they can stay where they are or they can move on. There's one or two of them that may be worth a bit of money and they might be able to walk out the door. But what I'm no gonna do this year Jim is, I'm no gonna hide what I done last year because the same players that have been asked to take cuts this year, are the same players as last year. And last year it was a very, very small amount that they cut off their wages and it's difficult where you're in a position where you have contracts that you've carried on from the SPL into the SFL First Division where your income is slashed quite substantially to try and carry these, so the players hopefully will realise and be sensible and say ok, we can do that. I mean it's only a year Jim, because they're all in the final years of their contract. It's only a year we're asking them to take these cuts and then hopefully we can be sensible, but we'll do it the right way Jim, we'll do it alongside the PFA and their agents."
JS – “What happens if the bank decide they can't support you anymore, is there a danger this club could disappear?”
No, no football clubs, very, very rarely Jim football clubs disappear. I mean Third Lanark was probably the exception and could have probably been saved. Even Airdrie when they disappeared got back in but no, I think there's a thing about football clubs that, that they survive.
Why would people come to work for Dundee, because Dundee's still a good club and whether it's the Marr's or whether it's anybody else runs the club, people perceive Dundee as a big club and Dundee is quite a big club. We're no quite as big as what we'd like to be but we are still quite a big club and hopefully that will be attractive to anybody to come.”
JS – “People say you're a hard man to work for. You hire and fire managers quickly.”
No, I dinnae believe that Jim, I think if you look at the situations, and on top of that people have said that we fire managers and dinna pay them. We have paid every manager every penny that we have been due them in the past. We're the whipping boys at the moment and then something will happen that will go back to Mr. Romanov next week, or David Murray, even David was getting a bit of stick earlier on, it'll be Desmond at Celtic, or it'll be somebody else but right at the moment because of Alan Kernaghan's situation, we're the whipping boys."