text:
Nick Bolkus

Nick Bolkus (born 17 July 1950) is a former Australian Labor Party politician. He was a member of the Senate from July 1981 to June 2005, representing the state of South Australia.

Early career
Bolkus was born in Adelaide and educated at Adelaide High School and the University of Adelaide. He was a lawyer in 1974 and 1975 before moving into political advising as a research officer for a number of Australian Labor Party (ALP) members including Clyde Cameron. He unsuccessfully ran for the district of Torrens at the 1975 state election and for the Senate at the 1977 federal election. He entered politics as a Senator for South Australia following the 1980 Australian federal election.

Parliamentary career
Bolkus was appointed to the outer Ministry as Minister for Consumer Affairs and Minister Assisting the Treasurer for Prices (1988–90). Bolkus was appointed as Minister for Administrative Services (1990–93) (a Ministry which was later relegated out of Cabinet), and then Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Multicultural Affairs (1993–96).

After the end of the Keating Government (due to its election defeat in 1996), Bolkus was Shadow Attorney-General and Minister for Justice from March 1996 to November 2001.

Minister for Consumer Affairs, Minister for Assisting for Prices 1988–90
Bolkus was first elected to the Federal Ministry in February 1988 as Minister for Consumer Affairs and Minister Assisting the Treasurer for Prices. In this portfolio he introduced world leading legislation to protect the privacy of individuals in their relationships with credit data agencies. He also introduced the Banking Ombudsman, streamlining National Uniform Food Laws, introducing a series of Codes of Conduct protecting consumers, and initiating enquiries into the pricing practices of the computer software, music and book industries.

Minister for Administrative Services 1990–93
Bolkus was appointed to Cabinet in 1990 as Minister for Administrative Services, a portfolio which he held until the 1993 election. In this portfolio he introduced comprehensive legislation for the disclosure of political donations. He transitioned the Department to a commercialized, corporatized and competitive body. Bolkus used the extensive reach of a department n such areas as Commonwealth property ownership, construction, purchasing and the Australian Electoral Commission, to pursue the government's environmental and industry policy agenda, particularly in the Information Technology area.

Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs 1993–96
In 1993, Bolkus was appointed Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Multicultural Affairs. He held these portfolios until the 1996 election. In these positions, Bolkus tried making both the Department's and Government's immigration, refugee and multicultural policies more relevant to Australia's social, economic and humanitarian needs.

Bolkus tried restructured both the Department and policy, including:
 * rewriting Australia's Migration laws
 * recognition of the importance of temporary business entry through initiatives such as the APEC card "invisible visa" entry for Tourism, and the Business "life of passport" visa
 * fundamental restructuring of the business migration program
 * the first review of the Australian Citizenship Act since its 1948 introduction
 * the establishment of the Refugee Review Tribunal
 * the revision of Australia's Oath and Allegiance by removing reference to the Queen
 * the introduction of a major Citizenship Promotion program
 * increase in the annual migration and refugee programs

Parliamentary committee experience
Bolkus has served on and Chaired a number of Parliamentary Committees in the areas of Legal and Constitutional Affairs, Foreign Affairs, Industrial Relations, Corporation Legislation, Indigenous Affairs, and Human Rights He was Chairman of the Senate Standing Committee on Constitutional and Legal Affairs. He represented the Australian Parliament at the 1983 and 1984 Constitutional Conventions and at the 41st General Assembly of the United Nations in 1986.

Other issues
In 2003, Bolkus was accused and personally attacked by Workplace Relations Minister Tony Abbott for failing to declare donations made by Dante Tan. Tan was not found guilty of any criminal offence in either the Philippines or Australia. Abbott accused Bolkus of having breached the legal requirements of accepting a political donation. Abbott also accused Bolkus of money laundering, however it became clear that the matter was in fact not a breach of any regulations regarding political donations. Bolkus successfully sued Nationwide News in the District Court of South Australia for defamation in Bolkus v Nationwide News.

Lobbying
Until 2015, Bolkus was a partner at Bespoke Approach, a corporate advisory firm. Bespoke Approach is now owned by corporate and political advisor Ian Smith and former Senior Vice-President at News Corporation Andrew Butcher.

Bolkus also offers political lobbying services under the names Kazaru and Nick Bolkus. Clients represented to the SA Parliament and SA government since 2016 include: SA Power Networks, Daycorp, D and R DeRuvo and sons, Fyfe, SSE Australia, Bedford Group, Walker Corporation, Lincoln Lakes Development Company, Kelaray Pty Ltd, Kangaroo Island Plantation Timbers Ltd, The Stehr Group, Tri-star Petroleum, Celsus/SA Health Partnership, Karadeniz Holdings, The Belgrave Group, RH & DJ Bichard Superfund.

Directorships and advisory positions
Nick Bolkus is the Chairman of Directors of Nuturf Australia Pty Ltd, and Envirogreen Pty Ltd. and Director of Wondertreat Aust Pty Ltd.and Ecofertiliser Pty Ltd.

He is Adviser to the Australian Hokkien Association.

He is also currently a Director of the industry based Australian Fisheries Academy.

title: Nick Bolkus


text:
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of British Columbia Regional Districts

This page is an archive of the discussion surrounding the proposed deletion of the page entitled List of British Columbia Regional Districts.

This page is kept as an historic record.

The result of the debate was to keep the article.

 * Delete Is now superseded by Template:BritishColumbia. Burgundavia 08:40, May 17, 2004 (UTC)
 * Keep- Unless you plan on deleting all the pages that have lists of counties that also have a media wiki. Hey, let's delete the list of Canadian provinces and territories while we're at it! Come on now. This page is not just about the list, it should be about the structure, the history, etc... Earl Andrew 14:42, 17 May 2004 (UTC)
 * Keep for the moment. We need to decide how best to avoid the need to maintain duplicated lists like this, that's unnecessary overhead. But that may mean a software upgrade, and we are unlikely to see this designed, coded and tested in the next five days. The mediawiki namespace is only new yet, and is being used in all sorts of ways, early days still. But very good point to raise. Is it already being discussed somewhere else? Andrewa 16:58, 17 May 2004 (UTC)
 * Keep. Actually I'm less than enthused about the current tendency to turn every list into a mediawiki message.  They have both advantages and disadvantages, especially if an article is on multiple lists (a politician who has held many different important offices, for example.)  Isomorphic 19:20, 19 May 2004 (UTC)

This page is now preserved as an archive of the debate and is no longer 'live'. Subsequent comments on the issue should be placed on other relevant 'live' pages. Please do not edit this page.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text: Template:British Columbia highways

title: Template:British Columbia highways


text:
Non-tariff barriers to trade

Non-tariff barriers to trade (NTBs; also called non-tariff measures, NTMs) are trade barriers that restrict imports or exports of goods or services through mechanisms other than the simple imposition of tariffs. Such barriers are subject to controversy and debate, as they may comply with international rules on trade yet serve protectionist purposes.

The Southern African Development Community (SADC) defines a non-tariff barrier as "any obstacle to international trade that is not an import or export duty. They may take the form of import quotas, subsidies, customs delays, technical barriers, or other systems preventing or impeding trade". According to the World Trade Organization, non-tariff barriers to trade include import licensing, rules for valuation of goods at customs, pre-shipment inspections, rules of origin ('made in'), and trade prepared investment measures. A 2019 UNCTAD report concluded that trade costs associated with non-tariff measures were more than double those of traditional tariffs.

The transition from tariffs to non-tariff barriers
One of the reasons why industrialized countries have moved from tariffs to NTBs is the fact that developed countries have sources of income other than tariffs. Historically, in the formation of nation-states, governments had to get funding. They received it through the introduction of tariffs. This explains the fact that most developing countries still rely on tariffs as a way to finance their spending. Developed countries can afford not to depend on tariffs, at the same time developing NTBs as a possible way of international trade regulation. The second reason for the transition to NTBs is that these barriers can be used to support weak industries or compensation of industries which have been affected negatively by the reduction of tariffs. The third reason for the popularity of NTBs is the ability of interest groups to influence the process in the absence of opportunities to obtain government support for the tariffs.

Non-tariff barriers today
With the exception of export subsidies and quotas, NTBs are most similar to the tariffs. Tariffs for goods production were reduced during the eight rounds of negotiations in the WTO and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT). After lowering of tariffs, the principle of protectionism demanded the introduction of new NTBs such as technical barriers to trade (TBT). According to statements made at United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD, 2005), the use of NTBs, based on the amount and control of price levels has decreased significantly from 45% in 1994 to 15% in 2004, while use of other NTBs increased from 55% in 1994 to 85% in 2004.

Increasing consumer demand for safe and environment friendly products also have had their impact on increasing popularity of TBT. Many NTBs are governed by WTO agreements, which originated in the Uruguay Round (the TBT Agreement, SPS Measures Agreement, the Agreement on Textiles and Clothing), as well as GATT articles. NTBs in the field of services have become as important as in the field of trade in goods.

Most of the NTB can be defined as protectionist measures, unless they are related to difficulties in the market, such as externalities and information asymmetries between consumers and producers of goods. An example of this is safety standards and labeling requirements.

The need to protect sensitive to import industries, as well as a wide range of trade restrictions, available to the governments of industrialized countries, forcing them to resort to use the NTB, and putting serious obstacles to international trade and world economic growth. Thus, NTBs can be referred as a new form of protection which has replaced tariffs as an old form of protection.

Types of Non-Tariff Barriers
Professor Alan Deardorff characterises NTB policies under three headings: Purposes, Examples, and Consequences

There are several different variants of the division or classification of non-tariff barriers. Some scholars divide them between internal taxes, administrative barriers, health and sanitary regulations and government procurement policies. Others divide them into more categories such as specific limitations on trade, customs and administrative entry procedures, standards, government participation in trade, charges on import, and other categories.

The first category includes methods to directly import restrictions for protection of certain sectors of national industries: licensing and allocation of import quotas, antidumping and countervailing duties, import deposits, so-called voluntary export restraints, countervailing duties, the system of minimum import prices, etc. Under second category follow methods that are not directly aimed at restricting foreign trade and more related to the administrative bureaucracy, whose actions, however, restrict trade, for example: customs procedures, technical standards and norms, sanitary and veterinary standards, requirements for labeling and packaging, bottling, etc. The third category consists of methods that are not directly aimed at restricting the import or promoting the export, but the effects of which often lead to this result.

The non-tariff barriers can include wide variety of restrictions to trade.

Administrative and bureaucratic delays at the border
Administrative and bureaucratic delays at the border increase uncertainty and the cost of maintaining inventory. For example, even though Turkey is in a (partial) customs union with the EU, transport of Turkish goods to the European Union is subject to extensive administrative overheads that Turkey estimates costs the Turkish economy three billion euros per year.

Censorship
Testifying before the United States Senate Committee on Finance, Subcommittee on International Trade, Customs, and Global Competitiveness on "censorship as a non-tariff barrier" in 2020, Richard Gere stated that economic interest compel studios to avoid social and political issues Hollywood once addressed, "Imagine Marty Scorsese's Kundun, about the life of the Dalai Lama, or my own film Red Corner, which is highly critical of the Chinese legal system. Imagine them being made today. It wouldn't happen."

Embargoes
Embargoes are outright prohibition of trade in certain commodities. As well as quotas, embargoes may be imposed on imports or exports of particular goods in respect of certain goods supplied to or from specific countries, or in respect of all goods shipped to certain countries. Although an embargo may be imposed for biosecurity reasons, more often the reasons are political (see economic sanctions and international sanctions). Embargoes are generally considered legal barriers to trade, not to be confused with blockades, which are often considered to be acts of war.

Foreign exchange restrictions and foreign exchange controls
Foreign exchange restrictions and foreign exchange controls occupy an important place among the non-tariff regulatory instruments of foreign economic activity. Foreign exchange restrictions constitute the management of transactions between national and foreign operators, either by limiting the supply of foreign currency (to restrict imports) or by state manipulation of exchange rates (to boost exports and limit imports).

Import deposits
Another example of foreign trade regulations is import deposits. Import deposits is a form of deposit, which the importer must pay the central bank for a definite period of time (non-interest bearing deposit) in an amount equal to all or part of the cost of imported goods.

Administrative regulation of capital movements
At the national level, administrative regulation of capital movements between states is carried out mainly within a framework of bilateral agreements, which include a clear definition of the legal regime, the procedure for the admission of investments and investors. It is determined by mode (fair and equitable, national, 'most favoured nation'), order of nationalization and compensation, transfer profits and capital repatriation and dispute resolution.

Licenses
The most common instruments of direct regulation of imports (and sometimes export) are licenses and quotas. Almost all industrialized countries apply these non-tariff methods. The license system requires that a state (through specially authorized office) issues permits for foreign trade transactions of import and export commodities included in the lists of licensed merchandises. Product licensing can take many forms and procedures. The main types of licenses are general license that permits unrestricted importation or exportation of goods included in the lists for a certain period of time; and one-time license for a certain product importer (exporter) to import (or export). One-time license indicates a quantity of goods, its cost, its country of origin (or destination), and in some cases also customs point through which import (or export) of goods should be carried out. The use of licensing systems as an instrument for foreign trade regulation is based on a number of international level standards agreements. In particular, these agreements include some provisions of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) / World Trade Organization (WTO) such as the Agreement on Import Licensing Procedures.

Localization requirement
An importing country may require the prospective exporter to include a degree of local participation in the product or service. Options include a designated importer, a joint-venture company with majority local control, requirement for complete local manufacture which may imply transfer of intellectual property. The WTO has not reached a conclusion on the legitimacy of these measures.

Standards
Standards take a special place among non-tariff barriers. Countries usually impose standards on classification, labelling and testing of products to ensure that domestic products meet domestic standards, but also to restrict sales of products of foreign manufacture unless they meet or exceed these same standards. These standards are sometimes entered to protect the safety and health of local populations and the natural environment. Standards which are ostensibly enacted for health and safety reasons can be used by states for trade protectionist and political purposes.

Quotas
Licensing of foreign trade is closely related to quantitative restrictions – quotas – on imports and exports of certain goods. A quota is a limitation in value or in physical terms, imposed on import and export of certain goods for a certain period of time. This category includes global quotas with respect to specific countries, seasonal quotas, and so-called "voluntary export restraints". Quantitative controls on foreign trade transactions are carried out through one-time license.

Quantitative restrictions on imports and exports are direct administrative forms of government regulation of foreign trade. Licenses and quotas limit the independence of enterprises with a regard to entering foreign markets, narrowing the range of countries in which firms can conduct trade for certain commodities. They regulate the range and number of goods permitted for import and export.

However, the system of licensing and quota imports and exports, establishing firm control over foreign trade in certain goods, in many cases turns out to be more flexible and effective than economic instruments of foreign trade regulation. This can be explained by the fact that licensing and quota systems are an important instrument of trade regulation of the vast majority of the world.

This type of trade barrier normally leads to increased costs and limited selection of goods for consumers and higher import prices for companies. Import quotas can be unilateral, levied by the country without negotiations with exporting country; or bilateral or multilateral, when they are imposed after negotiations and agreements.

An export quota is a limit on the amount of goods that can be exported from a country. There are different reasons for imposing export quotas from a country. These reasons include guaranteeing of the supply of the products that are in shortage in the domestic market, manipulation of the prices on the international level, and the control of goods strategically important for the country. In some cases, the importing countries request exporting countries to impose voluntary export restraints.

Agreement on a "voluntary" export restraint
In the past decade, a widespread practice of concluding agreements on the "voluntary" export restrictions and the establishment of import minimum prices imposed by leading Western nations upon exporters that are weaker in an economical or political sense. These types of restrictions involve the establishment of unconventional techniques when trade barriers are introduced at the border of the exporting country instead of the importing country.

Thus, the agreement on "voluntary" export restraints is imposed by the exporter under the threat of sanctions to limit the export of certain goods to the importing country. Similarly, the establishment of minimum import prices should be strictly observed by the exporting firms in contracts with the importers of the country that has set such prices. In the case of reduction of export prices below the minimum level, the importing country imposes anti-dumping duty, which could lead to withdrawal from the market. “Voluntary" export agreements affect trade in textiles, footwear, dairy products, consumer electronics, cars, machine tools, etc.

Problems arise when the quotas are distributed between countries because it is necessary to ensure that products from one country are not diverted in violation of quotas set out in second country. Import quotas are not necessarily designed to protect domestic producers. For example, Japan maintains quotas on many agricultural products it does not produce. Quotas on imports are used as leverage when negotiating the sales of Japanese exports, as well as avoiding excessive dependence on any other country with respect to necessary food; the supplies of which could decrease in case of bad weather or political conditions.

Export quotas can be set in order to provide domestic consumers with sufficient stocks of goods at low prices, to prevent the depletion of natural resources, as well as to increase export prices by restricting supply to foreign markets. Such restrictions (through agreements on various types of goods) allow producing countries to use quotas for such commodities as coffee and oil; as the result, prices for these products increased in importing countries.

A quota can be a tariff rate quota, global quota, discriminating quota, and export quota.

Scarcity of information
The scarcity of information on non-tariff barriers is a major problem to the competitiveness of developing countries. As a result, the International Trade Centre conducted national surveys and began publishing a series of technical papers on non-tariff barriers faced in developing countries. By 2015 it launched the NTM Business Surveys website listing non-tariff barriers from company perspectives.

title: Non-tariff barriers to trade


text:
Old Trafford

Old Trafford is a football stadium in Old Trafford, Greater Manchester, England, and the home of Manchester United. With a capacity of 74,310 it is the largest club football stadium (and second-largest football stadium overall after Wembley Stadium) in the United Kingdom, and the twelfth-largest in Europe. It is about 0.5 mi from Old Trafford Cricket Ground and the adjacent tram stop.

Nicknamed "The Theatre of Dreams" by Bobby Charlton, Old Trafford has been United's home ground since 1910, although from 1941 to 1949 the club shared Maine Road with local rivals Manchester City as a result of Second World War bomb damage. Old Trafford underwent several expansions in the 1990s and 2000s, including the addition of extra tiers to the North, West and East Stands, almost returning the stadium to its original capacity of 80,000. Future expansion is likely to involve the addition of a second tier to the South Stand, which would raise the capacity to around 88,000. The stadium's record attendance was recorded in 1939, when 76,962 spectators watched the FA Cup semi-final between Wolverhampton Wanderers and Grimsby Town.

Old Trafford has hosted an FA Cup Final, two final replays and was regularly used as a neutral venue for the competition's semi-finals. It has also hosted England fixtures, and matches at the 1966 FIFA World Cup, UEFA Euro 1996, the 2012 Summer Olympics and UEFA Women's Euro 2022. The stadium also hosted the 2003 Champions League Final. Outside football, the stadium is used occasionally for rugby league. It has been the venue for the Rugby Football League's annual Super League Grand Final, and previously Premiership Final, since 1987. In addition, it has been a host venue for five editions of the Rugby League World Cup - 1995, 2000, 2013, and 2021 (men's and women's).

Construction and early years
Before 1902, Manchester United were known as Newton Heath, during which time they first played their football matches at North Road and then Bank Street in Clayton. However, both grounds were blighted by wretched conditions, the pitches ranging from gravel to marsh, while Bank Street suffered from clouds of fumes from its neighbouring factories. Therefore, following the club's rescue from near-bankruptcy and renaming, the new chairman John Henry Davies decided in 1909 that the Bank Street ground was not fit for a team that had recently won the First Division and FA Cup, so he donated funds for the construction of a new stadium. Not one to spend money frivolously, Davies scouted around Manchester for an appropriate site, before settling on a patch of land adjacent to the Bridgewater Canal, just off the north end of the Warwick Road in Old Trafford.

Designed by Scottish architect Archibald Leitch, who designed several other stadia, the ground was originally designed with a capacity of 100,000 spectators and featured seating in the south stand under cover, while the remaining three stands were left as terraces and uncovered. Including the purchase of the land, the construction of the stadium was originally to have cost £60,000 all told. However, as costs began to rise, to reach the intended capacity would have cost an extra £30,000 over the original estimate and, at the suggestion of club secretary J. J. Bentley, the capacity was reduced to approximately 80,000. Nevertheless, at a time when transfer fees were still around the £1,000 mark, the cost of construction only served to reinforce the club's "Moneybags United" epithet, with which they had been tarred since Davies had taken over as chairman.

In May 1908, Archibald Leitch wrote to the Cheshire Lines Committee (CLC) – who had a rail depot adjacent to the proposed site for the football ground – in an attempt to persuade them to subsidise construction of the grandstand alongside the railway line. The subsidy would have come to the sum of £10,000, to be paid back at the rate of £2,000 per annum for five years or half of the gate receipts for the grandstand each year until the loan was repaid. However, despite guarantees for the loan coming from the club itself and two local breweries, both chaired by club chairman John Henry Davies, the Cheshire Lines Committee turned the proposal down. The CLC had planned to build a new station adjacent to the new stadium, with the promise of an anticipated £2,750 per annum in fares offsetting the £9,800 cost of building the station. The station – Trafford Park – was eventually built, but further down the line than originally planned. The CLC later constructed a modest station with one timber-built platform immediately adjacent to the stadium and this opened on 21 August 1935. It was initially named United Football Ground, but was renamed Old Trafford Football Ground in early 1936. It was served on match days only by a shuttle service of steam trains from Manchester Central railway station. It is currently known as Manchester United Football Ground.

Construction was carried out by Messrs Brameld and Smith of Manchester and development was completed in late 1909. The stadium hosted its inaugural game on 19 February 1910, with United playing host to Liverpool. However, the home side were unable to provide their fans with a win to mark the occasion, as Liverpool won 4–3. A journalist at the game reported the stadium as "the most handsomest [sic], the most spacious and the most remarkable arena I have ever seen. As a football ground it is unrivalled in the world, it is an honour to Manchester and the home of a team who can do wonders when they are so disposed".

Before the construction of Wembley Stadium in 1923, the FA Cup Final was hosted by a number of different grounds around England including Old Trafford. The first of these was the 1911 FA Cup Final replay between Bradford City and Newcastle United, after the original tie at Crystal Palace finished as a no-score draw after extra time. Bradford won 1–0, the goal scored by Jimmy Speirs, in a match watched by 58,000 people. The ground's second FA Cup Final was the 1915 final between Sheffield United and Chelsea. Sheffield United won the match 3–0 in front of nearly 50,000 spectators, most of whom were in the military, leading to the final being nicknamed "the Khaki Cup Final". On 27 December 1920, Old Trafford played host to its largest pre-Second World War attendance for a United league match, as 70,504 spectators watched the Red Devils lose 3–1 to Aston Villa. The ground hosted its first international football match later that decade, when England lost 1–0 to Scotland in front of 49,429 spectators on 17 April 1926. Unusually, the record attendance at Old Trafford is not for a Manchester United home game. Instead, on 25 March 1939, 76,962 people watched an FA Cup semi-final between Wolverhampton Wanderers and Grimsby Town.

Wartime bombing
In 1936, as part of a £35,000 refurbishment, an 80-yard-long roof was added to the United Road stand (now the Sir Alex Ferguson Stand) for the first time, while roofs were added to the south corners in 1938. Upon the outbreak of the Second World War, Old Trafford was requisitioned by the military to be used as a depot. Football continued to be played at the stadium, but a German bombing raid on Trafford Park on 22 December 1940 damaged the stadium to the extent that a Christmas Day fixture against Stockport County had to be switched to Stockport's ground. Football resumed at Old Trafford on 8 March 1941, but another German raid on 11 March 1941 destroyed much of the stadium, notably the main stand (now the South Stand), forcing the club's operations to move to Cornbrook Cold Storage, owned by United chairman James W. Gibson. After pressure from Gibson, the War Damage Commission granted Manchester United £4,800 to remove the debris and £17,478 to rebuild the stands. During the reconstruction of the stadium, Manchester United played their "home" games at Maine Road, the home of their cross-town rivals, Manchester City, at a cost of £5,000 a year plus a percentage of the gate receipts. The club was now £15,000 in debt, not helped by the rental of Maine Road, and the Labour MP for Stoke, Ellis Smith, petitioned the Government to increase the club's compensation package, but it was in vain. Though Old Trafford was reopened, albeit without cover, in 1949, it meant that a league game had not been played at the stadium for nearly 10 years. United's first game back at Old Trafford was played on 24 August 1949, as 41,748 spectators witnessed a 3–0 victory over Bolton Wanderers.

Completion of the master plan
A roof was restored to the Main Stand by 1951 and, soon after, the three remaining stands were covered, the operation culminating with the addition of a roof to the Stretford End (now the West Stand) in 1959. The club also invested £40,000 in the installation of proper floodlighting, so that they would be able to use the stadium for the European games that were played in the late evening of weekdays, instead of having to play at Maine Road. In order to avoid obtrusive shadows being cast on the pitch, two sections of the Main Stand roof were cut away. The first match to be played under floodlights at Old Trafford was a First Division match between Manchester United and Bolton Wanderers on 25 March 1957.

However, although the spectators would now be able to see the players at night, they still suffered from the problem of obstructed views caused by the pillars that supported the roofs. With the 1966 FIFA World Cup fast approaching, at which the stadium would host three group matches, this prompted the United directors to completely redesign the United Road (north) stand. The old roof pillars were replaced in 1965 with modern-style cantilevering on top of the roof, allowing every spectator a completely unobstructed view, while it was also expanded to hold 20,000 spectators (10,000 seated and 10,000 standing in front) at a cost of £350,000. The architects of the new stand, Mather and Nutter (now Atherden Fuller), rearranged the organisation of the stand to have terracing at the front, a larger seated area towards the back, and the first private boxes at a British football ground. The east stand – the only remaining uncovered stand – was developed in the same style in 1973. With the first two stands converted to cantilevers, the club's owners devised a long-term plan to do the same to the other two stands and convert the stadium into a bowl-like arena. Such an undertaking would serve to increase the atmosphere within the ground by containing the crowd's noise and focusing it onto the pitch, where the players would feel the full effects of a capacity crowd. Meanwhile, the stadium hosted its third FA Cup Final, hosting 62,078 spectators for the replay of the 1970 final between Chelsea and Leeds United; Chelsea won the match 2–1. The ground also hosted the second leg of the 1968 Intercontinental Cup, which saw Estudiantes de La Plata win the cup after a 1–1 draw. The 1970s saw the dramatic rise of football hooliganism in Britain, and a knife-throwing incident in 1971 forced the club to erect the country's first perimeter fence, restricting fans from the Old Trafford pitch.

Conversion to all-seater
With every subsequent improvement made to the ground since the Second World War, the capacity steadily declined. By the 1980s, the capacity had dropped from the original 80,000 to approximately 60,000. The capacity dropped still further in 1990, when the Taylor Report recommended, and the government demanded that all First and Second Division stadia be converted to all-seaters. This meant that £3–5 million plans to replace the Stretford End with a brand new stand with an all-standing terrace at the front and a cantilever roof to link with the rest of the ground had to be drastically altered. This forced redevelopment, including the removal of the terraces at the front of the other three stands, not only increased the cost to around £10 million, but also reduced the capacity of Old Trafford to an all-time low of around 44,000. In addition, the club was told in 1992 that they would only receive £1.4 million of a possible £2 million from the Football Trust to be put towards work related to the Taylor Report.

The club's resurgence in success and increase in popularity in the early 1990s ensured that further development would have to occur. In 1995, the 30-year-old North Stand was demolished and work quickly began on a new stand, to be ready in time for Old Trafford to host three group games, a quarter-final and a semi-final at Euro 96. The club purchased the Trafford Park trading estate, a 20 acre site on the other site of United Road, for £9.2 million in March 1995. Construction began in June 1995 and was completed by May 1996, with the first two of the three phases of the stand opening during the season. Designed by Atherden Fuller, with Hilstone Laurie as project and construction managers and Campbell Reith Hill as structural engineers, the new three-tiered stand cost a total of £18.65 million to build and had a capacity of about 25,500, raising the capacity of the entire ground to more than 55,000. The cantilever roof would also be the largest in Europe, measuring 58.5 m from the back wall to the front edge. Further success over the next few years guaranteed yet more development. First, a second tier was added to the East Stand. Opened in January 2000, the stadium's capacity was temporarily increased to about 61,000 until the opening of the West Stand's second tier, which added yet another 7,000 seats, bringing the capacity to 68,217. It was now not only the biggest club stadium in England but the biggest in all of the United Kingdom. Old Trafford hosted its first major European final three years later, playing host to the 2003 UEFA Champions League Final between Milan and Juventus.

From 2001 to 2007, following the demolition of the old Wembley Stadium, the England national football team was forced to play its games elsewhere. During that time, the team toured the country, playing their matches at various grounds from Villa Park in Birmingham to St James' Park in Newcastle. In that period, Old Trafford hosted 14 of England's 34 home matches, more than any other stadium. The latest international to be held at Old Trafford was England's 1–0 loss to Spain on 7 February 2007. The match was played in front of a crowd of 58,207.

2006 expansion
Old Trafford's most recent expansion, which took place between July 2005 and May 2006, saw an increase of around 8,000 seats with the addition of second tiers to both the north-west and north-east quadrants of the ground. Part of the new seating was used for the first time on 26 March 2006, when an attendance of 69,070 became a new Premier League record. The record continued to be pushed upwards before reaching its current peak on 31 March 2007, when 76,098 spectators saw United beat Blackburn Rovers 4–1, meaning that just 114 seats (0.15% of the total capacity of 76,212) were left unoccupied. In 2009, a reorganisation of the seating in the stadium resulted in a reduction of the capacity by 255 to 75,957, meaning that the club's home attendance record would stand at least until the next expansion.

Old Trafford celebrated its 100th anniversary on 19 February 2010. In recognition of the occasion, Manchester United's official website ran a feature in which a memorable moment from the stadium's history was highlighted on each of the 100 days leading up to the anniversary. From these 100 moments, the top 10 were chosen by a panel including club statistician Cliff Butler, journalist David Meek, and former players Pat Crerand and Wilf McGuinness. At Old Trafford itself, an art competition was run for pupils from three local schools to create their own depictions of the stadium in the past, present and future. Winning paintings were put on permanent display on the concourse of the Old Trafford family stand, and the winners were presented with awards by artist Harold Riley on 22 February. An exhibition about the stadium at the club museum was opened by former goalkeeper Jack Crompton and chief executive David Gill on 19 February. The exhibition highlighted the history of the stadium and features memorabilia from its past, including a programme from the inaugural match and a 1:220 scale model hand-built by model artist Peter Oldfield-Edwards. Finally, at Manchester United's home match against Fulham on 14 March, fans at the game received a replica copy of the programme from the first Old Trafford match, and half-time saw relatives of the players who took part in the first game – as well as those of the club chairman John Henry Davies and stadium architect Archibald Leitch – taking part in the burial of a time capsule of Manchester United memorabilia near the centre tunnel. Only relatives of winger Billy Meredith, wing-half Dick Duckworth and club secretary Ernest Mangnall could not be found.

Old Trafford was used as a venue for several matches in the football competition at the 2012 Summer Olympics. The stadium hosted five group games, a quarter-final and semi-final in the men's tournament, and one group game and a famous semi-final in the women's tournament, the first women's international matches to be played there. Since 2006, Old Trafford has also been used as the venue for Soccer Aid, a biennial charity match initially organised by singer Robbie Williams and actor Jonathan Wilkes; however, in 2008, the match was played at Wembley Stadium.

On 27 March 2021, Old Trafford hosted its first game of the Manchester United women's team, with West Ham United as the opposition in the Women's Super League. Exactly one year on, Manchester United's women's team face Everton at Old Trafford in front of a crowd for the first time (the 2021 game was behind closed doors due to the COVID-19 pandemic). A crowd of 20,241 attended the match, marking the highest home attendance of the women's team, and saw Manchester United come out with a 3–1 victory.

On 6 July 2022, Old Trafford hosted the opening match of UEFA Women's Euro 2022 between England and Austria, in front of a record attendance for the Women's European Championships of 68,871 – the second highest women's football attendance in the United Kingdom.

Old Trafford was included in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland's shortlist of stadiums to host UEFA Euro 2028 however was not included on the final list of 10.

Structure and facilities
The Old Trafford pitch is surrounded by four covered all-seater stands, officially known as the Sir Alex Ferguson (North), East, Sir Bobby Charlton (South) and West Stands. Each stand has at least two tiers, with the exception of the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand, which only has one tier due to construction restrictions. The bottom tier of each stand is split into Lower and Upper sections, the Lower sections having been converted from terracing in the early 1990s.

Sir Alex Ferguson Stand
The Sir Alex Ferguson Stand, formerly known as the United Road stand and the North Stand, runs over the top of United Road. The stand is three tiers tall, and can hold about 26,000 spectators, the most of the four stands. It can also accommodate a few fans in executive boxes and hospitality suites. It opened in its current state in 1996, having previously been a single-tiered stand. As the ground's largest stand, it houses many of the ground's more popular facilities, including the Red Café (a Manchester United theme restaurant/bar) and the Manchester United museum and trophy room. Originally opened in 1986 as the first of its kind in the world, the Manchester United museum was in the south-east corner of the ground until it moved to the redeveloped North Stand in 1998. The museum was opened by Pelé on 11 April 1998, since when numbers of visitors have jumped from 192,000 in 1998 to more than 300,000 visitors in 2009.

The North Stand was renamed as the Sir Alex Ferguson Stand on 5 November 2011, in honour of Alex Ferguson's 25 years as manager of the club. A 9 ft statue of Ferguson, sculpted by Philip Jackson, was erected outside the stand on 23 November 2012 in recognition of his status as Manchester United's longest-serving manager.

Sir Bobby Charlton Stand
Opposite the Sir Alex Ferguson Stand is the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand, formerly Old Trafford's main stand and previously known as the South Stand. Although only a single-tiered stand, the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand contains most of the ground's executive suites, and also plays host to any VIPs who may come to watch the match. Members of the media are seated in the middle of the Upper South Stand to give them the best view of the match. The television gantry is also in the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand, so the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand is the one that gets shown on television least often. Television studios are located at either end of the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand, with the club's in-house television station, MUTV, in the East studio and other television stations, such as the BBC and Sky, in the West studio.

The dugout is in the centre of the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand, raised above pitch level to give the manager and his coaches an elevated view of the game. Each team's dugout flanks the old players' tunnel, which was used until 1993. The old tunnel is the only remaining part of the original 1910 stadium, having survived the bombing that destroyed much of the stadium during the Second World War. On 6 February 2008, the tunnel was renamed the Munich Tunnel, as a memorial for the 50th anniversary of the 1958 Munich air disaster. The current tunnel is in the South-West corner of the ground, and doubles as an entrance for the emergency services. If large vehicles require access, then the seating above the tunnel can be raised by up to 25 ft. The tunnel leads up to the players' dressing room, via the television interview area, and the players' lounge. Both the home and away dressing rooms were re-furbished for the 2018–19 season, and the corridor leading to the two was widened and separated to keep the opposing teams apart.

On 3 April 2016, the South Stand was renamed the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand before kick-off of the Premier League home match against Everton, in honour of former Manchester United player Sir Bobby Charlton, who made his Manchester United debut 60 years earlier.

West Stand
Perhaps the best-known stand at Old Trafford is the West Stand, also known as the Stretford End. Traditionally, the stand is where the hard-core United fans are located, and also the ones who make the most noise. Originally designed to hold 20,000 fans, the Stretford End was the last stand to be covered and also the last remaining all-terraced stand at the ground before the forced upgrade to seating in the early 1990s. The reconstruction of the Stretford End, which took place during the 1992–93 season, was carried out by Alfred McAlpine. When the second tier was added to the Stretford End in 2000, many fans from the old "K Stand" moved there, and decided to hang banners and flags from the barrier at the front of the tier. So ingrained in Manchester United culture is the Stretford End, that Denis Law was given the nickname "King of the Stretford End", and there is now a statue of Law on the concourse of the stand's upper tier.

East Stand
The East Stand at Old Trafford was the second to be converted to a cantilever roof, following the Sir Alex Ferguson Stand. It is also commonly referred to as the Scoreboard End, as it was the location of the scoreboard. The East Stand can currently hold nearly 12,000 fans, and is the location of both the disabled fans section and the away section; an experiment involving the relocation of away fans to the third tier of the Sir Alex Ferguson Stand was conducted during the 2011–12 season, but the results of the experiments could not be ascertained in time to make the move permanent for the 2012–13 season. The disabled section provides for up to 170 fans, with free seats for carers. Old Trafford was formerly divided into sections, with each section sequentially assigned a letter of the alphabet. Although every section had a letter, it is the K Stand that is the most commonly referred to today. The K Stand fans were renowned for their vocal support for the club, and a large array of chants and songs, though many of them have relocated to the second tier of the Stretford End.

The East Stand has a tinted glass façade, behind which the club's administrative centre is located. These offices are the home to the staff of Inside United, the official Manchester United magazine, the club's official website, and its other administrative departments. Images and advertisements are often emblazoned on the front of the East Stand, most often advertising products and services provided by the club's sponsors, though a tribute to the Busby Babes was displayed in February 2008 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Munich air disaster. Above the megastore is a statue of Sir Matt Busby, who was Manchester United's longest-serving manager until he was surpassed by Sir Alex Ferguson in 2010. There is also a plaque dedicated to the victims of the Munich air disaster on the south end of the East Stand, while the Munich Clock is at the junction of the East and South Stands. On 29 May 2008, to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Manchester United's first European Cup title, a statue of the club's "holy trinity" of George Best, Denis Law and Bobby Charlton, entitled "The United Trinity", was unveiled across Sir Matt Busby Way from the East Stand, directly opposite the statue of Busby.

The Manchester United club shop has had six different locations since it was first opened. Originally, the shop was a small hut near to the railway line that runs alongside the ground. The shop was then moved along the length of the South Stand, stopping first opposite where away fans enter the ground, and then residing in the building that would later become the club's merchandising office. A surge in the club's popularity in the early 1990s led to another move, this time to the forecourt of the West Stand. With this move came a great expansion and the conversion from a small shop to a "megastore". Alex Ferguson opened the new megastore on 3 December 1994. The most recent moves came in the late 1990s, as the West Stand required room to expand to a second tier, and that meant the demolition of the megastore. The store was moved to a temporary site opposite the East Stand, before taking up a 17000 sqft permanent residence in the ground floor of the expanded East Stand in 2000. The floor space of the megastore was owned by United's kit sponsors, Nike, who operated the store until the expiry of their sponsorship deal at the end of July 2015, when ownership reverted to the club.

Pitch and surroundings
The pitch at the ground measures approximately 105 m long by 68 m wide, with a few metres of run-off space on each side. The centre of the pitch is about nine inches higher than the edges, allowing surface water to run off more easily. As at many modern grounds, 10 in under the pitch is an underground heating system, composed of 23 mi of plastic pipes. Former club manager Alex Ferguson often requested that the pitch be relaid, most notably half-way through the 1998–99 season, when the team won the Treble, at a cost of about £250,000 each time. The grass at Old Trafford is watered regularly, though less on wet days, and mowed three times a week between April and November, and once a week from November to March.

In the mid-1980s, when Manchester United Football Club owned the Manchester Giants, Manchester's basketball franchise, there were plans to build a 9,000-seater indoor arena on the site of what is now Car Park E1. However, the chairman at the time, Martin Edwards, did not have the funds to take on such a project, and the basketball franchise was eventually sold. In August 2009, the car park became home to the Hublot clock tower, a 10 m tower in the shape of the Hublot logo, which houses four 2 m clock faces, the largest ever made by the company.

The east side of the stadium is also the site of Hotel Football, a football-themed hotel and fan clubhouse conceived by former Manchester United captain Gary Neville. The building is located on the east side of Sir Matt Busby Way and on the opposite side of the Bridgewater Canal from the stadium, and can accommodate up to 1,500 supporters. It opened in the summer of 2015. The venture is conducted separately from the club and was funded in part by proceeds from Neville's testimonial match.

Future
In 2009, it was reported that United continued to harbour plans to increase the capacity of the stadium further, with the next stage pointing to a redevelopment of the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand, which, unlike the rest of the stadium, remains single tier. A replication of the Sir Alex Ferguson Stand development and North-East and North-West Quadrants would see the stadium's capacity rise to an estimated 95,000, which would give it a greater capacity than Wembley Stadium (90,000). Any such development is likely to cost around £100 million, due to the proximity of the railway line that runs adjacent to the stadium, and the corresponding need to build over it and thus purchase up to 50 houses on the other side of the railway. Nevertheless, the Manchester United group property manager confirmed that expansion plans are in the pipeline – linked to profits made from the club's property holdings around Manchester – saying "There is a strategic plan for the stadium ... It is not our intention to stand still".

In March 2016 (ten years after the previous redevelopment), talk of the redevelopment of the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand re-emerged. In order to meet accessibility standards at the stadium, an £11 million investment was made into upgrading its facilities, creating 118 new wheelchair positions and 158 new amenity seats in various areas around the stadium, as well as a new purpose-built concourse at the back of the Stretford End. Increasing capacity for disabled supporters is estimated to reduce overall capacity by around 3,000. To mitigate the reduction in capacity, various expansion plans have been considered, such as adding a second tier to the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand, bringing it to a similar height to the Sir Alex Ferguson Stand opposite but without a third level and increasing capacity to around 80,000. Replication of the corner stands on the other side of the stadium would further increase its capacity to 88,000 and increase the number of executive facilities. Housing on Railway Road and the railway line itself have previously impeded improvements to the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand, but the demolition of housing and engineering advances mean that the additional tier could now be built at reduced cost.

In 2018, it was reported that plans are currently on hold due to logistical issues. The extent of the work required means that any redevelopment is likely to be a multi-season project, due to the need to locate heavy machinery in areas of the stadium currently inaccessible or occupied by fans during match days and the fact that the stand currently holds the changing rooms, press boxes and TV studios. Club managing director Richard Arnold has said that "it isn't certain that there's a way of doing it which doesn't render us homeless." This would mean that Manchester United would have to leave Old Trafford for the duration of the works – and while Tottenham Hotspur were able to use the neutral Wembley Stadium for two seasons while their own new stadium was built, the only stadia of comparable size anywhere near Old Trafford are local rivals Manchester City's City of Manchester Stadium, or possibly Anfield, home of historic rivals Liverpool, neither of which are considered viable.

In 2021 United co-chairman Joel Glazer said at a Fans Forum meeting that "early-stage planning work" for the redevelopment of Old Trafford and the club's Carrington training ground was underway. This followed "increasing criticism" over the lack of development of the ground since 2006. The club is considering tearing down the current stadium and building an entirely new one on the same site, but this is believed to be the "least likely choice". In 2024, it was reported that 25 percent Manchester United shareholder Sir Jim Ratcliffe wants to demolish Old Trafford and build a "Wembley of the North" on the same site, potentially being funded by the government's Levelling Up program.

Rugby league
Old Trafford has played host to both codes of rugby football, although league is played there with greater regularity than union. Old Trafford has hosted every Rugby League Premiership Final since the 1986–87 season, in addition to the competition's successor, the Super League Grand Final from 1998.

The first league match to be held at Old Trafford came in November 1958, with Salford playing against Leeds under floodlights in front of 8,000 spectators.

The first rugby league Test match played at Old Trafford came in 1986, when Australia beat Great Britain 38–16 in front of 50,583 spectators in the first test of the 1986 Kangaroo tour. The 1989 World Club Challenge was played at Old Trafford on 4 October 1989, with 30,768 spectators watching Widnes beat the Canberra Raiders 30–18. Old Trafford also hosted the second Great Britain vs Australia Ashes tests on both the 1990 and 1994 Kangaroo Tours. The stadium also hosted the semi-final between England and Wales at the 1995 Rugby League World Cup; England won 25–10 in front of 30,042 fans. The final rugby league international played at Old Trafford in the 1990s saw Great Britain record their only win over Australia at the ground in 1997 in the second test of the Super League Test series in front of 40,324 fans.

When the Rugby League World Cup was hosted by Great Britain, Ireland and France in 2000, Old Trafford was chosen as the venue for the final; the match was contested by Australia and New Zealand, and resulted in a 40–12 win for Australia, watched by 44,329 spectators. Old Trafford was also chosen to host the 2013 Rugby League World Cup final. The game, played on 30 November, was won by Australia 34–2 over defending champions New Zealand, and attracted a crowd of 74,468, a world record for a rugby league international. During the game, Australia winger Brett Morris suffered a heavy crash into the advertising boards at the Stretford End, emphasising questions raised pre-match over the safety of Old Trafford as a rugby league venue, in particular the short in-goal areas and the slope around the perimeter. In January 2019, Old Trafford was selected to host the 2021 Rugby League World Cup finals, with the men's and women's matches being played as a double header.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, 2020 was the first year in which Old Trafford did not host the Super League Grand Final due to concerns about having to possibly reschedule the match, which Manchester United were unable to accommodate.

Rugby union
The first rugby union match to be played at Old Trafford was held during the 1924–25 New Zealand rugby union tour of Britain, Ireland and France, when a Lancashire representative side hosted the New Zealand national team, with Manchester United receiving 20 per cent of the gate receipts.

Old Trafford hosted its first rugby union international in 1997, when New Zealand defeated England 25–8. A second match was played at Old Trafford on 6 June 2009, when England beat Argentina 37–15. The stadium was one of 12 confirmed venues set to host matches of the 2015 Rugby World Cup; however, in April 2013 United pulled out of the contract over concerns about pitch quality and not wanting to compromise their relationship with the 13-man code.

Other sports
Before the Old Trafford football stadium was built, the site was used for games of shinty, the traditional game of the Scottish Highlands. During the First World War, the stadium was used by American soldiers for games of baseball. On 17 September 1981, the North Section of cricket's Lambert & Butler Floodlit Competition was played there; in the semi-finals, Nottinghamshire defeated Derbyshire and Lancashire beat Yorkshire, before Lancashire beat Nottinghamshire by 8 runs in the final to reach the national final, played between the other regional winners at Stamford Bridge the next day. In October 1993, a WBC–WBO Super-Middleweight unification fight was held at the ground, with around 42,000 people paying to watch WBO champion Chris Eubank fight WBC champion Nigel Benn.

Concerts and other functions
Aside from sporting uses, several concerts have been played at Old Trafford, with such big names as Bon Jovi, Genesis, Bruce Springsteen, Status Quo, Rod Stewart and Simply Red playing. An edition of Songs of Praise was recorded there in September 1994. Old Trafford is also regularly used for private functions, particularly weddings, Christmas parties and business conferences. The first wedding at the ground was held in the Premier Suite in February 1996.

Records
The highest attendance recorded at Old Trafford was 76,962 for an FA Cup semi-final between Wolverhampton Wanderers and Grimsby Town on 25 March 1939. However, this was before the ground was converted to an all-seater stadium, allowing many more people to fit into the stadium. Old Trafford's record attendance as an all-seater stadium currently stands at 76,098, set at a Premier League game between Manchester United and Blackburn Rovers on 31 March 2007. Old Trafford's record attendance for a non-competitive game is 74,731, set on 5 August 2011 for a pre-season testimonial between Manchester United and New York Cosmos. The lowest recorded attendance at a competitive game at Old Trafford in the post-War era was 11,968, as United beat Fulham 3–0 on 29 April 1950. However, on 7 May 1921, the ground hosted a Second Division match between Stockport County and Leicester City for which the official attendance was just 13. This figure is slightly misleading as the ground also contained many of the 10,000 spectators who had stayed behind after watching the match between Manchester United and Derby County earlier that day.

The highest average attendance at Old Trafford over a league season was 75,826, set in the 2006–07 season. The greatest total attendance at Old Trafford came two seasons later, as 2,197,429 people watched Manchester United win the Premier League for the third year in a row, the League Cup, and reach the final of the UEFA Champions League and the semi-finals of the FA Cup. The lowest average attendance at Old Trafford came in the 1930–31 season, when an average of 11,685 spectators watched each game.

Transport
Adjacent to the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand of the stadium is Manchester United Football Ground railway station. The station is between the Deansgate and Trafford Park stations on the Southern Route of Northern Rail's Liverpool to Manchester line. It originally served the stadium on matchdays only, but the service was stopped at the request of the club for safety reasons. The stadium is serviced by the Altricham, Eccles, South Manchester and Trafford Park lines of the Manchester Metrolink network, with the nearest stops being Wharfside, Old Trafford (which it shares with the Old Trafford Cricket Ground) and Exchange Quay at nearby Salford Quays. All three stops are less than 10 minutes' walk from the football ground.

Buses 255 and 256, which are run by Stagecoach Manchester and 263, which is run by Arriva North West run from Piccadilly Gardens in Manchester to Chester Road, stopping near Sir Matt Busby Way, while Stagecoach's 250 service stop outside Old Trafford on Wharfside Way and X50 service stops across from Old Trafford on Water's Reach. There are also additional match buses on the 255 service, which run between Old Trafford and Manchester city centre. Other services that serve Old Trafford are Arriva's 79 service (Stretford – Swinton), which stops on Chester Road and 245 (Altrincham – Exchange Quay), which stops on Trafford Wharf Road, plus First Greater Manchester service 53 (Cheetham – Pendleton) and Stagecoach's 84 service (Withington Hospital – Manchester), which stop at nearby Trafford Bar tram stop. The ground also has several car parks, all within walking distance of the stadium; these are free to park in on non-matchdays.

title: Old Trafford


text:
Alphonse Juin

Alphonse Pierre Juin (16 December 1888 – 27 January 1967 ) was a senior French Army general who became Marshal of France. A graduate of the École Spéciale Militaire class of 1912, he served in Morocco in 1914 in command of native troops. Upon the outbreak of the First World War, he was sent to the Western Front in France, where he was gravely wounded in 1915. As a result of this wound, he lost the use of his right arm.

After the war, he attended the École Supérieure de Guerre. He chose to serve in North Africa again. After the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939, he assumed command of the 15th Motorized Infantry Division. The division was encircled in the Lille pocket during the Battle of France and Juin was captured. He was a prisoner of war until he was released at the behest of the Vichy Government in 1941, and was assigned to command French forces in North Africa.

After Operation Torch, the invasion of Algeria and Morocco by British and American forces in November 1942, Juin ordered French forces in Tunisia to resist the Germans and the Italians. His great skills were exhibited during the Italian campaign as commander of the French Expeditionary Corps. His expertise in mountain warfare was crucial in breaking the Gustav Line, which had held up the Allied advance for six months.

Following this assignment, he was Chief of the Staff of the French forces and represented France at the San Francisco Conference. In 1947 he returned to Africa as the Resident-General of France in Morocco, where he opposed Moroccan attempts to gain independence. Next came a senior NATO position as he assumed command of CENTAG until 1956. During his NATO command, he was promoted to Marshal of France in 1952. He was greatly opposed to Charles De Gaulle's decision to grant independence to Algeria, and was "retired" in 1962 as a result. He was the French Army's last living Marshal of France until his death in Paris in 1967, when he was buried in Les Invalides.

Early years
Alphonse Juin was born at Bône (now Annaba) in French Algeria on 16 December 1888, the only son of Victor Pierre Juin, a soldier who became a gendarme after 15 years of military service, mostly in Algeria, and his wife Précieuse Salini, the daughter of another soldier who had also become a gendarme. He was named after his paternal grandfather. When he was six, his family moved to Constantine, where he went to primary school, and learnt Arabic from the local boys. In 1902 he was awarded a bursary to study at the Lycée d'Aumale in Constantine.

In 1909 he passed the entrance examination for the École spéciale militaire. At that time cadets were required to spend a year in the Army before commencing the course, so he enlisted in an Algerian regiment, the 1st Zouaves Regiment, quickly rising to corporal and then sergeant. He entered Saint-Cyr in 1910. Classes are named, and his class, the 94th, was known as promotion de Fès after the Moroccan city of Fès that was at the centre of the Agadir Crisis of 1911. Among the class of 223, which included eight foreigners from China, Turkey, Iran and Algeria, were future général d'armée Antoine Béthouart, three future généraux de corps d'armée, four future généraux de division and eighteen future généraux de brigade, including Charles de Gaulle. There would remain a special bond between members of the class, and de Gaulle would always address Juin using the personal pronoun tu. Juin, de Gaulle and Béthouart would give their names to the Saint-Cyr classes of 1966–68, 1970–72 and 2000–03 respectively.

After graduating on 1 October 1912, Juin was commissioned as a sous-lieutenant in an Algerian regiment, the 1st Algerian Tirailleurs Regiment. He soon saw service in Morocco in the Zaian War, participating in the fighting around Taza.

First World War
Upon the outbreak of the First World War in August 1914, a brigade of five battalions known as the Brigade des Chasseurs Indigènes was formed from Moroccan troops and sent to the Western Front in France. Juin joined Chef de Bataillon Joseph-François Poeymirau's 2e Régiment des Chasseurs Indigènes as a lieutenant. On 5 September, the brigade joined the fighting in the First Battle of the Marne. Juin was wounded in his left hand the following day, but refused evacuation to hospital, remaining at the front with his arm in a sling. He was awarded the Cross of the Legion of Honour. The brigade was withdrawn from the line in January 1915, but committed to battle again in March in the First Battle of Champagne. In this battle Juin was again wounded, this time in his upper right arm. The damage was permanent, and he was given permission to henceforth salute with his left.

Juin found Poeymirau, who had also been wounded, in the hospital, and Poeymirau arranged for Juin to be sent back to Morocco in December 1915 to convalesce. Promoted to capitaine, Juin joined Moroccan troops preparing to go to France, but he accepted an offer from Général de division Hubert Lyautey, the Resident-General in Morocco, to become his aide-de-camp for six months. Juin returned to France towards the end of 1916 in command of a company of the , participating in the Nivelle Offensive in April 1917. He was selected for staff training in February 1918. When he returned in October 1918, he was initially posted to the staff of his division, but then joined the French Mission to the United States Army, where he served when the fighting ended in November 1918.

Interwar
After the war, Juin returned to the 1st Moroccan Tirailleurs Regiment, but was seconded to Lyautey's staff, and then sent to École Supérieure de Guerre for more staff training. After graduating in 1921, he was posted to the headquarters of the division in Tunisia. He turned down an offer of a staff appointment in Paris to serve under Poeymirau in Morocco, but Poeymirau died suddenly in 1924. Lyautey then divided Morocco into two commands. When Juin arrived at the new headquarters in Fès, he found Capitaine Jean de Lattre de Tassigny occupying the position of G-3 (Operations) that Juin had expected. Since Juin was staff trained and de Lattre was not, Juin became G-4 (Logistics) and had as principal task the supplying of the forts in the Ouergha River area. During the Rif War, he served on the staff of Colonel Charles Noguès. For his services leading troops in the field, Juin was made an officer of the Legion of Honour and promoted to Chef de bataillon.

Lyautey was blamed for the French lack of preparedness for the war and relieved of his command. As a marshal, Lyautey was member of the Conseil supérieur de la guerre, and as such was entitled to a small staff of three officers. He asked Juin to be its head, and Juin accepted even though it was a desk job in Paris for an officer with little influence. He refused even to attend the infrequent conseil meetings because of the presence of Marshal Philippe Pétain. Juin was best man at de Lattre's wedding to Simonne Calary de Lamazière in March 1927.

Juin returned to North Africa in September 1927 to assume command of a battalion of the 19th Algerian Tirailleurs Regiment. He married Marie Gabrielle Cécile Bonnefoy, the daughter of an Army veterinary surgeon who had moved to Constantine and become a businessman, in 1928. They had two sons: Pierre and Michel. The following year he became military secretary to Noguès, who was now the director of political affairs in Morocco. An army requirement for officers to complete six months in command of a battalion before they could be promoted made Juin spend six months in command of a battalion of the 1st Zouaves Regiment. He was promoted to lieutenant-colonel in March 1932, returning to his previous post in time for active operations that year. They were successful, and he was posted to the École Supérieure de guerre as an instructor in 1933. Once again he chafed under the prevailing linear defence doctrine, and he returned to North Africa in 1935 to become second in command and then commander of the 3rd Zouaves Regiment. He was promoted to colonel in June 1935.

Noguès became resident-general in Morocco in 1937, with the expectation that he would become commander in chief in North Africa in the event of hostilities with Nazi Germany. If that happened, Noguès wanted Juin for his chief of staff, but since Juin was only a colonel, it was arranged for him to attend a senior officers course at the Centre des hautes études militaires. On graduation, he returned to Algiers, where he was promoted to the rank of général de brigade on 26 December 1938.

Fall of France
After the Second World War broke out in September 1939, Juin helped arrange the despatch of units from the Armée d'Afrique to help defend metropolitan France. On 4 December, he was given command of the 15e Division d'Infantrie Motorisée (15e DIM). After the German attack began on 10 May 1940, the 15e DIM was ordered into Belgium to hold the area around Gembloux. This was held against German attacks on 14 and 15 May, before the defenders were compelled to retreat to Valenciennes. The 15e DIM came under heavy German attack on 24 May, and retreated into the Lille pocket, where it covered the British and French forces fighting in the Battle of Dunkirk. Some units of his division managed to escape to Dunkirk; the remainder fought until their ammunition ran out. Juin surrendered on 29 May.

Juin became a prisoner of war, and was held in Oflag IV-B Koenigstein, a prison camp for officers in Königstein Fortress in Saxony. While in prison he was promoted to Général de division. He was released in June 1941 at the request of Pétain, now the head of the Vichy Government, in exchange for thirty German sailors, as a specialist in North African affairs. He was promoted to Général de corps d'armée on 16 July, and became commander of the troops in Morocco. Admiral François Darlan offered him the post of Minister for War following the death of Général d'armée Charles Huntziger in November 1941, but Juin turned down the offer, saying that he only wished to serve in North Africa. On 20 November, he was promoted to Général de corps d'armée, replacing Maxime Weygand as commander of French land forces in North Africa. In December he led a French mission to Germany that met with Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring to discuss what would happen if the German-Italian Panzerarmee Afrika was driven out of Libya by Operation Crusader. This did not occur, but a dispute over what should be done led to Juin relieving de Lattre of command of the forces in Tunisia, permanently damaging their friendship.

North African campaign
Operation Torch, the invasion of Algeria and Morocco by British and American forces, came as a complete surprise to Juin, who had not been brought into secret discussions concerning the operation. He was informed of the landings by Robert Daniel Murphy, the American consul-general in Algiers, on the morning of 8 November 1942 as the first waves were heading toward the beaches. Juin had previously told Murphy that his orders were to resist an invasion of North Africa, but he agreed to immediately consult with Darlan, who arrived at Juin's villa within minutes. Darlan, in turn, sent a message to Pétain in Vichy. Murphy was placed under house arrest in Juin's villa, the pro-Allied troops who had surrounded the villa were driven away, and Général de division Charles Mast, who had collaborated with the Allies, was relieved by Général de division Louis Koeltz.

Juin did not want Algeria occupied by the Americans any more than he wished France to be occupied by the Germans, but he recognized the reality of the situation. Darlan authorised Juin to negotiate a local ceasefire in Algiers, so Juin met with American Major General Charles W. Ryder, commander of the U.S. 34th Infantry Division, and the two arranged for an end to the fighting. Algiers was handed over to the Americans, French troops were confined to barracks but retained their weapons, and French police maintained law and order. French resistance to the Allies continued elsewhere in North Africa until Darlan issued a ceasefire on 10 November, and directed Juin to order French forces in Tunisia to resist the Germans and the Italians. Juin's orders were not always obeyed by his subordinates in Tunisia, many of whom believed that Darlan and Juin were being held prisoner by the Americans, but he was able to personally persuade Noguès to work with the Allies.

In the reorganisation of French forces in North Africa on 13 November, Juin became commander of the Eastern Sector. His command, known as the Détachement d'armée Français, held two distinct sectors on the Tunisian front, one in the north under Général de brigade Fernand Barré, and one in the south under Koeltz. His forces were poorly equipped, and when the Germans and Italians counter-attacked, he had to call on the British and Americans for assistance. In January 1943, Juin agreed to a more regular command arrangement, with French forces being concentrated in Koeltz's XIX Corps, which was placed under Lieutenant General Kenneth Anderson's British First Army.

Juin was promoted to Général d'armée. He was given a tumultuous welcome from the populace when he entered Tunis after the Allies captured the city in May. De Gaulle appointed Mast as Resident-General in Tunisia, but Mast was injured in an air crash, and Juin was asked to fill in for him. In this role, Juin joined General Dwight D. Eisenhower, Général d'armée Henri Giraud, Admiral Sir Andrew Cunningham, Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Tedder and Lieutenant General Kenneth Anderson on the review stand for the victory parade on 20 May. A less savoury part of the job was informing Muhammad VII al-Munsif, the Bey of Tunisia, that he was being deposed. When Juin was informed that Pétain had stripped him of his French nationality and membership in the legion of honour, he merely noted that he was grateful he had not been sentenced to death.

Italian campaign
In July 1943, Eisenhower, now the Supreme Allied Commander in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations (MTO), raised the possibility of French troops being used in the upcoming Italian campaign with Juin, who accepted on behalf of Giraud, who was in Washington, D.C. Juin was placed in charge of a force known as Détachement d'armée A, which was intended to eventually grow into an army headquarters. Since it would form part of the U.S. Fifth Army, under the lower-ranking American Lieutenant General Mark W. Clark, Juin styled his command the Corps Expéditionnaire Français (CEF), and took a reduction in rank to Général de corps d'armée. When the first division of the CEF, the 2nd Moroccan Infantry Division (2e DIM), arrived in November 1943, it was initially placed under the command of American Major General John P. Lucas's U.S. VI Corps. In his diary Lucas noted that Juin "turned out to be not only a splendid soldier but a fine and courteous gentleman as well."

Juin's CEF relieved Lucas's VI Corps in the line when the CEF's second division, the 3rd Algerian Infantry Division (3e DIA) arrived in December. For the CEF, the First Battle of Monte Cassino began on 12 January 1944, with the CEF advancing four miles to the upper Rapido River and the main defences of the German Gustav Line. After the Allied landings at Anzio on 22 January 1944, he began an attack on Monte Belvedere, about 5 mi north of Monte Cassino. On 29 January, he reported to Clark that "At the cost of unbelievable efforts and great losses," the 3rd Algerian Infantry Division had "accomplished the mission which you gave them."

After three unsuccessful attempts to break the Gustav Line, British General Sir Harold Alexander, Commander-in-Chief (C-in-C) of the Allied Armies in Italy (AAI, later designated 15th Army Group), decided to make a coordinated attack with both the U.S. Fifth Army and Lieutenant General Sir Oliver Leese's British Eighth Army, codenamed Operation Diadem. As was the British custom, General Alexander gave his subordinates considerable latitude in how they went about implementing his orders. This allowed Juin to put forward a major modification to the plan. He proposed that the CEF, now increased to four divisions, advance through the rugged Aurunci Mountains and outflank the German positions. He was aware of the difficulty of trying to advance, much less exploit a breakthrough over the mountain trails, but felt that the 4th Moroccan Mountain Division and Moroccan Goumiers could do it.

According to Clark:"Meantime, the French forces had crossed the Garigliano (River) and moved forward into the mountainous terrain lying south of the Liri River. It was not easy. As always, the German veterans reacted strongly and there was bitter fighting. The French surprised the enemy and quickly seized key terrain including Mounts Faito Cerasola and high ground near Castelforte. The 1st Motorized Division helped the 2nd Moroccan division take key Mount Girofano and then advanced rapidly north to S. Apollinare and S. Ambrogio. In spite of the stiffening enemy resistance, the 2nd Moroccan Division penetrated the Gustav Line in less than two days' fighting.

The next 48 hours on the French front were decisive. The knife-wielding Goumiers swarmed over the hills, particularly at night, and General Juin's entire force showed an aggressiveness hour after hour that the Germans could not withstand. Cerasola, San Giogrio, Mt. D'Oro, Ausonia and Esperia were seized in one of the most brilliant and daring advances of the war in Italy, and by May 16 the French Expeditionary Corps had thrust forward some ten miles on their left flank to Mount Revole, with the remainder of their front slanting back somewhat to keep contact with the British Eighth Army.

Only the most careful preparations and the utmost determination made this attack possible, but Juin was that kind of a fighter. Mule pack trains, skilled mountain fighters, and men with the strength to make long night marches through treacherous terrain were needed to succeed in the all-but-impregnable mountain ranges. The French displayed that ability during their sensational advance which Lieutenant General Siegfried Westphal, the chief of staff to Kesselring, later described as a major surprise both in timing and in aggressiveness. For this performance, which was to be a key to the success of the entire drive on Rome, I shall always be a grateful admirer of General Juin and his magnificent FEC."

Clark made a triumphal entry into Rome, with Juin sitting next to him. For Juin, the experience was bittersweet. He felt that the fruits of his victory had been lost through British caution and the American obsession with Rome's capture. The French command rejected his support for continuing the campaign in Italy now that the Allies were winning. On 4 July, the CEF captured Siena, where it celebrated Bastille Day, and then was withdrawn to participate in Operation Dragoon, codename for the Allied invasion of Southern France. In the wake of allegations of raping and pillaging by his North African troops in the Marocchinate, he took steps to curtail the abuses, with drastic measures, including the death penalty, that were not entirely successful owing to the animosity between the French and Italian people over the events of 1940.

Chief of Staff
Following this assignment Juin was appointed chief of staff of French forces ("Chef d'État-Major de la Défense Nationale"). He helped persuade Eisenhower to allow Philippe Leclerc's 2nd Armoured Division to carry out the liberation of Paris, and he entered the city with de Gaulle on 25 August 1944. He restored order to the liberated areas, suppressing elements of the French Forces of the Interior (FFI) that refused to disband with Spahis that he brought in from North Africa. He arranged with Eisenhower for FFI personnel to be absorbed into four new divisions that guarded the German forces that remained in bypassed garrisons along the Atlantic coast, and the frontier with Italy.

During the German Operation Northwind in January 1945, he clashed with Eisenhower's chief of staff, Lieutenant General Walter B. Smith, over a proposed Allied withdrawal from Alsace and Lorraine. In the event, Eisenhower gave way to political pressure from the British and the French, and the withdrawal was not carried out. Juin also opposed the attack on Royan in April 1945, but it was carried out anyway over his objections.

Later life
At the time of the end of the war in Europe, Juin was in the United States, where he represented France at the San Francisco Conference. In the immediate post-war period he continued with his task of rebuilding France's armed forces. This was made difficult by the ending of American Lend-Lease aid, and the military commitments to the Allied occupation of Germany, and in North Africa, Syria and Italy, where the 1947 Paris Peace Treaties made some adjustments to the border. The major looming crisis, though, was the Indochina War. Juin lost his direct access to the President when de Gaulle left office in 1946, and his plans for an Army large enough to handle France's commitments had to be scaled back.

In May 1947, Juin returned to Africa as the Resident-General in Morocco. He opposed Moroccan attempts to gain independence and worked uneasily with Mohammed V, the Sultan of Morocco, whom Juin correctly suspected of harbouring nationalist sympathies. Juin forbade religious schools and certain gatherings, which he felt were being taken over by nationalists. During his tenure he instituted many administrative reforms, and greatly expanded opportunities for Moroccans, but it was overshadowed by the growing drift to independence. General Guillaume replaced him in August 1951.

Although Juin visited Indochina in April 1946, and met with Ho Chi Minh, he was not interested in a command there. He likewise turned down an offer in 1948 to command the Western European Union land forces. He returned to Indochina in October 1950, when he was sent to report on the state of France's efforts there. He produced a damning report, in which he criticised both the strategy and tactics being employed. But he again turned down an offer to command the French forces in Indochina, being far more concerned about the situation in North Africa.

On 20 November 1952, Juin was elected at the Seat 4 of the Académie Française.

In 1953 Juin took up a senior NATO position as he assumed command of CENTAG. Once again he served under Eisenhower. He also got along well with Eisenhower's successors, Generals Matthew Ridgway and Alfred Gruenther, whom he had known from the campaign in Italy. During his NATO command, he was made a Marshal of France in May 1952, the only living holder of that rank. After the French defeat in Indochina in the Battle of Dien Bien Phu in 1954, Juin was again asked if he would take over command in Indochina. He was greatly moved by the disaster, in which his former aide was killed, but in the end turned the job down again. He retired on 1 October 1956, coinciding with Gruenther's retirement, as he did not wish to serve under any other American general.

Juin was greatly opposed to de Gaulle's decision to grant independence to Algeria, although he remained steadfastly loyal to de Gaulle. In the wake of the Algiers putsch of 1961 and the Organisation Armée Secrète terrorist campaign, he was placed under house arrest. He was "retired" and his special privileges as a marshal were taken away. In December 1963, he suffered a thrombosis and was hospitalised in the Val-de-Grâce, where he was visited by de Gaulle. Delirious, Juin spoke of "Constantine, Algeria, my country", to which de Gaulle embraced him and replied "Yes, I know, your country is there".

In the event, Juin did not die, but remained frail for the rest of his life. He suffered a heart attack November 1966, and was again taken to the Val-de-Grâce, where he died on 22 January 1967. A funeral was held at Notre Dame de Paris, which was attended by old comrades including Alexander, Ridgway, Béthouart, Marcel Carpentier and de Gaulle, after which Juin was interred in Les Invalides with full military honours.

General references

 * Danigo, Ludovic. "General Alphonse Juin: A Case Study in Leadership and Coalition Warfare (Italy 1943-1944)" (U.S.  Defense Technical Information Center, 2011)  online
 * Danigo, Ludovic. "General Alphonse Juin: A Case Study in Leadership and Coalition Warfare (Italy 1943-1944)" (U.S.  Defense Technical Information Center, 2011)  online
 * Danigo, Ludovic. "General Alphonse Juin: A Case Study in Leadership and Coalition Warfare (Italy 1943-1944)" (U.S.  Defense Technical Information Center, 2011)  online
 * Danigo, Ludovic. "General Alphonse Juin: A Case Study in Leadership and Coalition Warfare (Italy 1943-1944)" (U.S.  Defense Technical Information Center, 2011)  online
 * Danigo, Ludovic. "General Alphonse Juin: A Case Study in Leadership and Coalition Warfare (Italy 1943-1944)" (U.S.  Defense Technical Information Center, 2011)  online

title: Alphonse Juin