member loginOrganisation
Shareholders United (SU), the Manchester United supporter-shareholder organisation has changed its name and its constitution. We have converted from Shareholders United, a Company Limited by Guarantee to I-MUST Limited, an Industrial & Provident Society registered with the Financial Services Authority under number 30024R and whose registered office is at 129 Ducie House, 37 Ducie Street, Manchester M1 2JW.
The privatisation and delisting of Manchester United means that SU members are no longer shareholders and, with sadness, the board recognises that Shareholders United is no longer an appropriate title, despite the proud historic record of the name. From now on the organisation will be known as MUST, and will promote itself as the independent Manchester United supporters’ trust. This reflects the organisation’s longstanding connection with and support for the supporters’ trust movement and its association with Supporters Direct.
Supporters Direct is a government initiative, funded by public money, which aims to promote and support the concept of democratic, supporter representation at and ownership of football clubs through mutual, not-for-profit structures. Established in September 2000, it acts as an umbrella organisation for the supporters’ trust movement providing support and guidance to clubs in crisis. SU, founded to fight the attempted takeover of Manchester United by Rupert Murdoch’s BSkyB and set up in 1998, was one of the earliest supporters’ trusts. From its inception Supporters Direct recognised SU as the recognised supporters’ trust at Manchester United. In our early days Supporters Direct provided financial, administrative and moral support and our first Chair, Jonathan Michie, was also one of its founding directors.
However since SU came into being before Supporters Direct, and because of the particular nature of the plc structure of Manchester United at the time, SU was set up differently from the later, recommended, Supporters Direct model. We were initially an Unincorporated Members’ Association of supporter-shareholders. But as the organisation grew and we set up our share scheme to promote the widening of share ownership among United fans, we converted the organisation to a Company Limited by Guarantee in order to protect our members from unlimited liability. Now that the club's ownership is in private hands, we find ourselves in the same situation as many supporters’ trust around the country - albeit with many more members - organising to be ready to step back in and reclaim our club when the time comes. And thus we changed our structure again, this time to the Supporters Direct preferred model for supporters’ trusts - an Industrial and Provident Society (IPS).
An IPS is a democratic, mutual, not-for-profit organisation with an emphasis on civic and community activities, registered with and overseen by the Financial Services Authority (FSA). In common with other supporters’ trusts, MUST believes that football clubs should be owned by the communities they serve. This does not mean that clubs shouldn’t be professionally run and organised. Nor does it mean that football clubs shouldn’t generate a profit. It does mean that any profit should not go into the pockets of investors but should be used for the good of the football club, ie for the development of the team and for the benefit of its supporters, and in promoting the development of football throughout the club’s community. In United’s case the community is world-wide.
MUST will continue to be, as SU was, a democratically-run, voluntary organisation with an elected board of directors and committee. Committee meetings will be well advertised and open to all members who wish to attend and there will be an open Annual General Meeting. Members will continue to be kept informed of the activities of MUST via the website, email, text and through our quarterly newsletter. Our complete Rules are posted here.
Copyright © 2007 MUST, the independent Manchester United supporters trust. All rights reserved.
We are the official trust for Manchester United FC, but please don't confuse us with the Glazer-owned United. Click here to understand what this means.