Football Governance Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Hayward and Baroness Taylor of Bolton

Report stage
Monday 17th March 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hayward (Con)]

My Lords, I begin by asking the Minister, when she responds to this debate, to identify specifically whether she intends to accept the amendments in the names of the noble Lord, Lord Birt, and others now or to change anything for Third Reading. I believe that we need absolute clarity of the position both for this and future debates.

I suggest that the Minister should look at the people proposing this amendment. This is not some party operation: we have a former head of broadcasting organisations who, as he identified, spent his time negotiating the original football broadcasting rights; a former Lord Chief Justice; a former senior civil servant; and a current senior lawyer. It is important that the Minister asks herself why it is impossible for her and her team to accept the carefully considered and detailed amendments that we are debating.

When I spoke at Second Reading, I identified a willingness to consider the proposal as it is in the Bill because, unlike the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, I have faith in people, other than just lawyers, able to take an impartial decision. I speak, as I have identified previously, as somebody who has spent many years negotiating with trade unions—and I use the word “with” deliberately, as I was across the table from them. I always regarded it as a failure if we did not get to an agreement between management and the trade unions.

I have considered what we are talking about carefully. I have not discussed it with my colleagues, but have looked at my industrial experience and asked myself whether the proposal put forward by the Government or that put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Birt, is better. There is an inherent misunderstanding of what we are talking about here. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, identified, we are not talking about two sides. Earlier today, the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, referred to the different levels of the competition—the Premier League, the Championship and the lower leagues—so it is not a question of one versus the other because, as sure as eggs are eggs, once you get into the discussion about allocation of resources, you discover that there are not two sides and a pendulum that swings from one direction to the other. There is a series of different interests all the way up the league table to the absolute top. Therefore, you cannot ask us to accept a process that awards to one side or the other, when there are not in fact two sides but several sides, which will respond very differently depending on where they are in the league structure in any season.

I started by asking the Minister a very serious question, which I will repeat: can she please give a very clear indication to the Chamber of what the Government’s view is of the very serious, excellently drafted and well-debated proposal from the noble Lord, Lord Birt, and others?

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton (Lab)]

My Lords, I want to say a few words, because the whole House acknowledges that the noble Lord, Lord Birt, is trying to be constructive here. He, with his colleagues, has produced some incredibly detailed amendments, and that is partly what concerns me. I am not saying that there is no merit in his approach, but I think that some of the conditions are potentially overburdensome.

Will the Minister remind the House of the purpose behind the backstop? As I understand it, the backstop was there to encourage parties to come together, discuss the situation and try to reach agreement. That is so important, because we have had the absence of agreement in recent years because, I think, of the stubbornness of one party.

I therefore worry that the amendments from the noble Lord, Lord Birt, and his colleagues are overprescriptive. He mentioned several of the problems that exist in football today, such as the level and unsustainability of players’ wages and the need for stadium improvements. All are relevant and important to those of us who are concerned about the future of football but, if we are going to be prescriptive about what comes in at that last stage, we may get into difficulties. I hope that the “state of the game” report, which he mentioned and which is extremely important going forward, will deal with some of these issues.

I would like to agree with the noble Lord that all of football is two sides of the same family, but I am not sure that that has been the experience of the last few years in the negotiations between the Premier League and the EFL. It certainly is not a balanced debate or discussion in terms of their powers. I understand the noble Lord’s wish to have levels of arbitration, but we must be careful not to cause delays or take the pressure off parties to come to an agreement between themselves.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton (Lab)]

My Lords, I have tabled amendments asking that Parliament should fulfil its role of scrutinising regulators across the board. I am glad that, in this one respect, my noble friend the Minister has taken that on board with this particular regulator in terms of the review that the noble Lord, Lord Norton, has just referred to. Very often, the problem has been that Parliament itself has not been proactive enough. This amendment ensures that Parliament will have to take some notice.

[Lord Hayward (Con)]

My Lords, I will briefly touch on a subject I raised at length in Committee and which we have not touched on at Report: costs and compliance. The Minister, very helpfully—I say “very helpfully”, but I am going to add a “but”—wrote to all relevant noble Lords on 6 March. I have a feeling that this is just the sort of thing that will come up for review once the IFR is in operation.

Football Governance Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Hayward and Baroness Taylor of Bolton

Committee stage
Wednesday 4th December 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for outlining the provisions that she thinks adequately cover this point. However, if discretion still exists on issues such as being guilty of serious misconduct, then I have a concern. I am not sure that there should be discretion in a case of a serious misconduct. Maybe the point she raised about conflicts of interest and that conflicting with other parts of the Bill covers it, but I have this fear that, if there is discretion, the chief executive of the independent football regulator might be put under pressure by others. That can be a serious concern in any organisation. In a sense, I think these amendments would protect people from having to use discretion. If somebody was found guilty of serious misconduct, that would elevate the issue again.

[Lord Hayward (Con)]

I am particularly interested in what the noble Baroness just said about the pressure being imposed on a chief executive. If, having looked at a case in detail and correctly in terms of procedure and the like, he then gives way to pressure from elsewhere —it may well be political pressure of one form or another—would you not call into question whether you have the right chief executive in the first place?

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton (Lab)]

Yes. That is why we need to protect the chief executive or anybody else by not giving them this kind of discretion, which might leave them open to any kind of pressure. I am not sure it would be political pressure; it is quite likely to be internal political pressure with a small “p”, rather than political in the way that we discuss things. I ask my noble friend to consider this a bit further because, given the categorisation, there is a potential problem. I know she has taken an interest in this so, on that basis, I will withdraw the amendment.

Football Governance Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Hayward and Baroness Taylor of Bolton

Committee stage
Monday 2nd December 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton (Lab)]

I totally agree with what has just been said about segmenting the fan base. I do not support a team that has the wide support that Liverpool has, but I was once at a football match in Buenos Aires where I was asked by local people which team I supported. When I mentioned Bolton Wanderers, just about everybody around me said instantly “Nat Lofthouse”, so these things travel. I accept that, but when we are talking about this Bill and about consulting fans on ticket pricing, the club’s heritage or moving grounds, then it is the locality that is in question, and we should not lose sight of that.

[Lord Hayward (Con)]

My Lords, I shall first pick up the comment from my noble friend Lord Moynihan of Cheslea. Whether it was an intervention on an intervention, I intervened from a sedentary position, and he heard my comments in relation to friendlies. I was not denying what he was saying; I was expressing support to the extent that pre-season friendlies take place to a substantial amount already and they achieve, to use the word currently in the Bill, an element of sustainability because they provide income from matches all around the world. The noble Lord, Lord Wood, commented earlier on. If ever there was an indication of the strength of support for a football club in another part of the world, all anybody has to do is type in “Liverpool” and “Melbourne cricket ground” to watch a full 100,000-plus Liverpool supporters singing their anthem at the start of a match. That is the extent of the support that our clubs have around the world, and it provides substantial income to the club. There are not many as large as Liverpool, but there is support right around the world.

Football Governance Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Hayward and Baroness Taylor of Bolton

Committee stage
Wednesday 27th November 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton (Lab)]

My Lords, I want to make a few brief comments, not least because, as I have been here rather a long time, I know what is happening when speakers use the words “word search” and “dictionary definition”. It is not exactly intended to accelerate the passage of a Bill. I will be brief even if others, perhaps, were not. I remind Members opposite that this Bill came out of an inquiry from a Conservative former Sports Minister and was a Conservative piece of legislation introduced in the other House, so it is not exactly rushed. In terms of sustainability, there are a heck of a lot of clubs that would settle for any guarantee that they had a future and that the future was more secure for them.

[Lord Hayward (Con)]

I have great respect for the noble Baroness, but she just made reference to comments I made in relation to word search. I believed that doing the word search emphasised the point I was trying to make in relation to the amendment that I had tabled and the comments that other people had made as well.

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton (Lab)]

That is how the noble Lord saw it, and I will say it how I saw it. What I was going to say in relation to the last contribution was that, yes, we all want the football leagues—the Premier League and everybody—to flourish and be more successful, but football will be a success only if the whole pyramid can flourish and be sustainable.

I want to say a word about Amendment 10, which is just one practical suggestion that could be considered to help clubs manage their own financial stability. One of problems we have seen in football over recent years is a degree of optimism on the part of football management about what it can achieve by minimal investment. Amendment 10, which my noble friend Lord Bassam and I have tabled, suggests that regulated clubs under the Bill should meet a financial commitment to have resources for at least six months. Many businesses are under very similar obligations. Charities have to have some financial security, so it would be worth considering whether we should actually make that kind of obligation something that the regulator should look at because, unless we get the overall funding of football clubs more sustainable, the whole pyramid will not be sustainable.