Discrimination in Football

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Hayward

Thursday 11th April 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I agree with the noble Baroness that institutional bias is often present. It is easy to tackle the overt and obvious instance of racism, but institutional bias is more complicated and insidious. As I explained to the noble Lord, Lord Addington, we are trying to deal with that to an extent by seeking to get wider representation and greater diversity not only among players but among the staff and management of football. One of the outputs of the round table is to look at the measures to improve the flow of information through instant reporting and the responses made to players, as well as to encourage positive behaviour and ensure that everyone—match officials, stewarding operations, coaching and, most important, football academy staff—is fully aware of their responsibilities in this matter.

[Lord Hayward (Con)]

My Lords, I would like to ask a question related to the culture in football, but I will go in a slightly different direction. Reference has been made to homophobia. I was the founding chairman of the world’s first gay rugby club. In rugby there is a culture that allows the world’s top rugby referee and a former captain of the Wales rugby team to be openly gay. One of my own club members played in the Varsity game last year and listed his membership of a gay rugby club without any comment being made. That in effect is the culture that has developed in rugby. When we are talking about discrimination, we should not talk only about racism. I admire enormously Raheem Sterling and others, but we should look at the other aspects of diversity. I recognise that the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, has raised the question of disability as well as other forms of discrimination that the top levels of the Football Association must look at. I shall put forward one suggestion. The World Rugby Museum has a large section devoted to disability, women, gender and sexuality, but I am told that the equivalent National Football Museum has no space for most of these elements. That is the sort of culture to which we have to address ourselves.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I completely agree with my noble friend. We were talking about racism, but the title of the Statement says “Discrimination”—that means discrimination of all kinds. We have taken that on board. Incidentally, a representative of Stonewall was present at the round table, so I absolutely accept my noble friend’s point and we are keen to make progress in that area as well.