Following on from Jonathan Stone’s Personal Statement of 27th July 2017 the Wakefield & District Community Trust (the Trust) and Wakefield Trinity (the Club) would like to make the following Joint Statement.

Sir Rodney Walker resigned from the W&DCT in February 2017 claiming that he was forming his own Trust yet 6 months on his Trust still does not appear to have been registered with Companies House or the Charities Commission. Furthermore despite requests from the Trust and the Media he seems very reluctant to name the members of his Board of Trustees.

Sir Rodney has been invited on a number of occasions to re-join the W&DCT and was given a deadline of close of business on Friday 28th July by which to accept that invitation but we regret to announce that we have not heard anything from him so can only assume that he does not wish to accept the invitation and consequently the invitation to him to re-join this Trust has been withdrawn.

The W&DCT and the Club have at all times acted reasonably in this matter in being prepared to allow Sir Rodney to re-join the Trust he Chaired for around 7 years. This is despite him walking away from the Trust and his past failings in agreeing to allow Newcold to be excluded from the trigger included in the Section 106 Agreement, failing to inform any other Trust Board Members and advising the Club not to make a bid to buy back Belle Vue because Yorkcourt would acquire it which they failed to do so.

The Trust and the Club therefore will not work with Sir Rodney and his Trust, if it is ever registered, and call upon him to walk away and allow the W&DCT to get on with the job of delivering this Stadium. Furthermore the Club has made it clear to all parties that they will only lease and play in the Stadium if it is delivered and owned by the Wakefield & District Community Trust.

We therefore call upon Cllr Peter Box and the Council to acknowledge that the Wakefield & District Community Trust, the Trust that they themselves established to facilitate the delivery of the Stadium, the Trust that is named in the Section 106 Agreement and was named in the Public Inquiry is the only Trust that they are prepared to work with and together work towards delivering this Stadium.

As ever a dignified statement from those with the interests of WT at heart.

An excellent statement.

It says exactly what needs to be said.

You have to be able to trust everybody in your camp and sadly, it sounds like that trust in SRW broke down long ago.

A great shame but we move on.

You all must have the hearts of lions, as dignified as ever, keep fighting for what we deserve. Keep the faith

So...any more news in the pipeline? Is the alternative Trust packing in and walking?

Looking on Companies House there is no alternative Trust.

So what the funk is this idiot up to? It's announced that he's gonna arrange his own trust, since then we've heard nothing publicly from him, he hasn't had the decency to respond to the trusts offer to rejoin, he has made no public statement, hasn't publicly announced his members, certainly hasn't registered the said trust. Was it ever a genuine idea on his part to create this new trust? He can't have decided to start his own trust as a means to stall the originals trust in doing their job. None of it makes any sense at all.

Well I'm glad you've said that mate cos its baffling us all. For the last few months its always looked that way and MC and the Trust have been very diplomatic in their responses.
What has really surprised me is how long some Trin fans have blindly clung on in the hope that RW was the saviour.

Maybe because he told us he was?

It's strange, I think that as a club we have suffered from being rather gullible on many occasions relating to plans for development over the last 50 years.
The theatre club, south stand, west stand, Pearman's super squad, Ted's eternal optimism, Glover's hype, numerous dead-cert stadium plans, Mr Box's reassurances and Rodders'll fix it,

Hopefully, this is a new era and MC & CB can see clearly through the bull.

Why wouldn't they - he hadn't to anyone's knowledge done anything wrong. Also he did have a terrific record in stadium provision up til this point. I'm glad you have the gift of hinsight, must be great