Leeds were going to take both Harris and us to court. We settled, but Leeds said they were still going to go after Harris. He in turn blamed his solicitors for advising him and said he was going to sue them. We had already shown that Leeds were prepared to settle, and thats probably what happened on the quiet with the solicitors PI insurance paying Leeds.

I still have trouble with the sums though. Leeds had the option to sign him for twelve months, no more, and they had to pay the same rate as Cardiff, a basic of £200000 plus bonuses which you have to net off the income they lost through him not playing for them that year. so according to your source their losses were 1,500,000 minus £350,000 which is £1,150,000 compensation from Harris/his ex solicitors. that is a lot of money for one year by the time you have added back his salary of surely over £300,000 for that year, its back up to £1.5M. No wonder Leeds wanted to be sensible. It would not surprise me that the whole thing was £500,000 in total ie us 350,000 and Harris £150,000 from PI, not per year. If not then his ex solicitors are paying through the nose for PI insurance, oh dear.

but thanks for your posts, its helped my understanding of the whole issue even if it hasnt changed my guestimate.

The whole Harris saga could and should have been sorted out without going to court.

In any event what should have happened - and ought to be the case for any disputes between RFL member clubs - is mandatory independent arbitration, including binding results of said arbitration on both parties. Whoever replaces Lewis should make damn sure such a rule is in place to prevent anything like this happening again. I got blasted on the Leeds board a while ago for daring to suggest that even though it looked like Leeds might win the case, they should drop the whole thing. It is simply not worth the negative impact its had on the Bulls.

Even in standard commercial agreements the use of mandatory arbitration (at least before any consideration of going to court) is quite common. I find it bizarre that in a relatively small, underfinanced sport like RL, member clubs are apparently able to blast each other into non-existence by following ridiculously expensive court actions.

The problem is, the biggest part of it was!!! The BUlls were never found by a court to have induced Harris to break his contract, nor was Harris found to be breaching his contract. they were both setteld out of court. IMO Harris only settled because the bulls had and this weakened his position! The only court judgement was that Harris was not having his trade restrained by leeds inserting the first option to the agreement.

if it had gone to court, at least we could have seen who was right or wrong, and just how bad CC's judgemnet was. as it is, he's always got the defence of " we would have won if Hood hadnt bottled it"

Well the as far as I know Caisley refused to go to Court thus weakening the Bulls position, without Caisley there the case was considerably weakened, the Club had no option but to settle out of Court in the Whinos favour, Caisley never had a defence, he was the one who "bottled" it

Blotto In view of Judge Grays ruling that clause 5 applied, and given that Harris had not complied with Clause 5 there was no way Leeds could lose a breach of contract claim against Harris. I cannot comment on the inducement issue, but Caisley is a solicitor and will know only too well what defending such a claim, so I would have done exactly the same. Which are strange words for me to write as whilst I was a Caisley fan until about 2007 I most definitely am not now.

Isaac1it was not just restraint of trade that were put as arguements against the enforceability of that clause, uncertainty (the amount Leeds would pay him under the contract clause could not be precisely calculated) and lack of consideration (ie Leeds gave Harris nothing in exchange for that clause). Gray ruled that it could be calculated with reasonable certainty, and that Harris had received the benefit of two years higher pay with Cardiff than at Leeds so had received consideration.
once he had ruled that the clause was enforceable it was shooting fish in a barrel time for Leeds.

Quote: martinwildbull "but thanks for your posts, its helped my understanding of the whole issue even if it hasnt changed my guestimate.'" No problem at all. Take a look at this link: www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/s ... ulls_back/ As you can see the three installments were well documented Where they show on the BB's accounts I do not know - Im not an accountant and I have no intention to be. I do know the outcome of Harris v his solicitors, but as this is a discussion about BB - we'll leave that there.

Quote: martinwildbull "but thanks for your posts, its helped my understanding of the whole issue even if it hasnt changed my guestimate.'" No problem at all. Take a look at this link: www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/s ... ulls_back/ As you can see the three installments were well documented Where they show on the BB's accounts I do not know - Im not an accountant and I have no intention to be. I do know the outcome of Harris v his solicitors, but as this is a discussion about BB - we'll leave that there.

Someone posted the court documents from the Leeds V Harris V Bradford case but i cant see the link to them.

Could that person please do so again so I can print them and show a leeds fan at work who is adamant Leeds didnt get anything from us or the WRU for his tfr.

Thanks

My point wasn't about the ins-and-outs of the Harris case in particular. The point is that RFL member clubs should find it almost impossible to engage in legal proceedings against one another, as the rules should force them to use binding arbitration rather than resort to legal action.

Arbitration is far, far cheaper, and the rulings/findings of the arbitrators would be able to incorporate the fact that we are actually dealing with what are quite small businesses - i.e. no ridiculous monetary penalties would be imposed.

As it stands, it seems that RFL member clubs are able to resort to highly expensive legal action which ALWAYS results in a net outflow of cash from the game to lawyers. I just don't get it.

Quote: bowlingbull "Someone posted the court documents from the Leeds V Harris V Bradford case but i cant see the link to them. Could that person please do so again so I can print them and show a leeds fan at work who is adamant Leeds didnt get anything from us or the WRU for his tfr. Thanks'" www.5rb.com/case/Leeds-Rugby-Ltd ... ldings-Ltd

Quote: bowlingbull "Someone posted the court documents from the Leeds V Harris V Bradford case but i cant see the link to them. Could that person please do so again so I can print them and show a leeds fan at work who is adamant Leeds didnt get anything from us or the WRU for his tfr. Thanks'" www.5rb.com/case/Leeds-Rugby-Ltd ... ldings-Ltd

Indeed. Same as most folk never got it that the loss of profit to Leeds because Harris did not return to them was £3.2m, according to their legal action. That would have made Leeds far far and away the most profitable club the game had ever known, I guess, hade Harris actually returned to them. Must have been some absolutely unvelievable sponsorship deals on the table...

But the RFL as then constituted seemed to have no qualms about one SL club seeking to blast another into oblivion. Presumably it could happen again?

I suspect they were already viewing the antics of BBH, and that chubby little welshman with distaste, and were perfectly happy for you to receive a legal handbagging....

[i"The case presented a classic conflict between player and club. Its main interest lies in the restraint of trade findings. Did the law require this star player to be protected against a restriction accepted with professional advice? The judge saw it as a fair deal from which Harris had benefited considerably. Leeds had waived a valuable contract with 2 years to run, giving the player the chance of better pay at Cardiff (£200K pa plus bonuses) and membership of the national union team. If he was required to go back to Leeds the contract guaranteed that Harris would be no worse off than if he had stayed at Cardiff."[/i

£3.2m plus costs is hardly "Handbagging", any more than blasting someone with a bazooka at point-blank range is likely to lead to just some bad bruising for the recipient.

Think I'll stick with "Blasting another club into oblivion", if its all the same to you.

Maybe the RFL was as unhappy with Caisley as Caddick was, and so were entirely at ease with seeing one club totally destroy another?

And you'll get no bonus points on here for quoting reasons why Caisley seemingly got it so badly wrong; most of us came to realise that ages ago, which is one of the reasons why he is not being universally welcomed as a white knight riding to the rescue.

Indeed. In fact, has Caisley ever uttered a single word of regret or any syllable of acceptance that he did actually get the Harris thing at all wrong? I can't readily recall one, so presumably his position is still that there was nothing wrong with the signing.

I have my doubts that the Kaiser has uttered a single word of regret on any matter ever.