I am here today representing the Board, and I want to make public our thanks to Ian Robson for the last four years.  We have accepted Ian’s resignation and I think his statement is a testament to him as a person and a professional.

I know that this is not the way Ian or the Board wanted his term to finish at Essendon.   

I want to reinforce what Ian has said – that he did offer his resignation earlier, but it was my strong view that we needed him to assist in getting the club through the first phase of this very distressing and difficult time.

The last four months have been incredibly tough as we have tried to keep our players, families, members and sponsors informed as much as possible - while cooperating with the external authorities. This has put a lot of pressure on the club, and I have nothing but the highest praise for the role that Ian Robson has played in stabilizing and leading the club during this time.

Ian was part of the decision-making that led us to self report to the AFL and to ASADA, and he not only supported the Board’s decision to conduct the external review, he assisted in opening the club up to Dr. Switkowski to ensure that he had all that was required to prepare his report into governance.

As Ian has made clear, any good CEO must be accountable for the failures that have happen in their organisations, and there is no doubt we as a club made mistakes in 2012.  

On the back of the Switkowski report, Ian has put his hand up today to accept accountability for what happened on his watch, but I also hope that in time, he does get recognition for the great things he did for our club.

He leaves on the eve of the club’s move to its new premises – a project he can be very proud of and which will always stand as a legacy of his time as CEO of the Essendon Football Club.   Ian established early on in his term as CEO that Essendon needed to take the next step - and his vision, his fundraising, his stakeholder management and his ability to be the face of our club sees us about to move to state of the art facilities and a new home in the north and he leaves us with record membership and a strong commercial base.  

We will be making an announcement in the next 24 hours about a caretaker CEO.   There will be time to talk about the next steps for our club, but I want to remind you that we are still subject to the ASADA and AFL investigation and I will ask you again for patience.  The Board is still considering and working through all the recommendations of the Switkowski review.    

But today I do want to focus on Ian.  He will be missed by his staff and by the team.  He has truly been a great servant of the Essendon Football Club. Those of you who know him -  know what a cheerful and good natured person he is – what I have learnt over the last few months is how incredibly resilient and strong he is under pressure and in a crisis, and I personally thank him for the support he has given me and the board.

Thanks very much.