Anderton's £250,000 pay-off from SRU

PHIL Anderton, the Hearts chief executive, received a pay-off of at least £250,000 when he quit his post with the Scottish Rugby Union, it emerged last night.

News of Anderton's golden handshake is expected to be included in the SRU's annual accounts, which are released to member clubs today. It was ratified by Fred McLeod, the union's interim chairman and chief executive.

The accounts will show that the SRU made a loss of £2.3million last year, taking their overall debt to around £21million. The financial situation is so bad that staff at Murrayfield have been told to expect redundancies.

Anderton quit as chief executive of the SRU in January in protest at the forced removal from office of David Mackay, the chairman of the union's executive board. Anderton was in the post less than a year, after being promoted from the position of marketing director. He took over at Tynecastle in March.

The size of the pay-off has infuriated the traditionalists on the SRU's general committee whose fight with modernisers Anderton and Mackay was at the root of Scottish rugby's so-called civil war. The split has led to an overhaul of the way the game is governed.

The former chief executive is believed to have negotiated a clause in his contract which stated that should Mackay be removed from office then Anderton would be entitled to leave with a full pay-off. The clause was rubber-stamped by the SRU's executive committee.

An SRU spokesman refused to confirm the size of the pay-out to Anderton but admitted redundancies were imminent at Murrayfield.

He said: "There was a meeting of staff at Murrayfield on Thursday, when they were advised that a change programme was under way as a consequence of re-structuring and budgetary requirements. This programme is likely result in several redundancies - however, some other jobs will be created."

On the Anderton payment, he added: "I cannot make any comment because, although the accounts have been ratified by the relevant authorities, they have not yet been published. They are being circulated among member clubs and will be discussed at the agm on Friday."

Anderton's spokesman Jack Irvine said: "Phil was anticipating an outbreak of bad-mouthing from within the SRU. The situation is that when he left Murrayfield, he received 18 months salary as per his contract - plus certain bonuses.

"This was signed off by Fred McLeod and the amount came to £250,000, which was taxed. Anyone who says he received a different sum is not telling the truth."

Taken from the Scotsman