Professional Wrestling: Event Licensing and Guidance Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateAlex Davies-Jones
Main Page: Alex Davies-Jones (Labour - Pontypridd)Department Debates - View all Alex Davies-Jones's debates with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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I beg to move,
That this House has considered the matter of professional wrestling event licensing and guidance.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Betts. The all-party parliamentary group on wrestling is without a doubt one of the most joyous and exciting in this institution. I am proud to be an active vice-chair, and I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones) and the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mark Fletcher)—our co-chairs—and to our group secretary, Danny Stone. They have brought serious and appropriate discussion of wrestling into this place, where too often in the past it was mocked.
Among our number we have fans of World Wrestling Entertainment, All Elite Wrestling, Impact, New Japan Pro-Wrestling and, most importantly, British promotions such as the all-women show EVE, PROGRESS, Revolution Pro Wrestling, NORTH, TNT and Renaissance, as well as start-ups such as the all-new women’s promotion, Galzilla, which literally hatched from an egg on the stage at the amazing Wrestival festival in London this year. Those wrestling promotions span the country, as do wrestling schools. In my constituency of Warrington North, we have our own wrestling academy, the Warrington Wrestling Academy, and I look forward to many Warringtonians making their way to the major leagues in years to come.
Fans often remark that, in the UK, one could go to a wrestling event nearly every night of the week, if one wanted to do so, and pack out the weekends with entertainment. Shows run in schools, gyms, entertainment venues and even fields. Of course, to run events safely and to a standard, there is a licensing requirement—or at least there should be.
In April 2021, the APPG released what constitutes the first ever thorough, systemic parliamentary analysis of wrestling. One of its key themes is the categorisation of wrestling as either theatre or sport. That might appear a simple matter, but wrestling involves serious athleticism alongside dramatic performance. There are competitions, albeit predetermined ones. Both Sport England and Arts Council England have funded wrestling, but neither particularly wants the responsibility of being a home for English wrestlers or wrestling.
Our APPG took the view—a novel one, I think—that for wrestling schools, the designation should be sporting, whereas promotions should be classed as theatrical. As the report made clear, defining promotions as theatrical entertainment opens up conversations about licensing, representation, governance, and improved policies and procedures. On the matter of policies and procedures, we were pleased to work recently with Loughborough University, with support from the PlayFight wrestling school, on the first ever parliamentary conference on wrestling, and we are developing a guide to better practice, which we hope will be informed by those in the industry, to help others across the British wrestling world.
We were told during the all-party group’s inquiry that the lack of a definition, whether as sport or art, created a minefield when it came to insurance and licensing. We have concerns that for promotions, the licensing system may still be somewhat of a minefield, particularly when people are navigating different licensing schemes. We know for certain that there are issues in this wholly unregulated industry. Concerns were raised with us about poor or, in some cases, illegal practices, ranging from tax malpractice and fraud to dangerous health and safety arrangements and sexual harassment. We were repeatedly warned about a lack of adequate medical supplies and supervision. The inquiry received one submission that drew on a wider understanding of promotions in the north of England and suggested that expertise to identify and treat injuries was “only intermittently present” at shows.
I am particularly grateful to Professor Claire Warden at Loughborough for her insights. She highlighted how the approaches of local councils can differ remarkably in just a few miles, even if the language used in licensing forms is similar. In Leicester, for instance, wrestling is considered “regulated entertainment”—in itself interesting, given the wholly unregulated nature of wrestling in actuality—alongside the performance of a play, exhibition or music, or an indoor sporting event. Boxing is the only sport mentioned on the list.
In Nottingham, wrestling is licensed under the “regulated entertainment” classification, but with a caveat that, although no licence is required for Greco-Roman or freestyle, combined fighting sports are licensable as boxing or wrestling entertainment, rather than an indoor sporting event. Similarly, Derby City Council, which has a whole section on boxing, wrestling and fighting sports, seems to compare wrestling to mixed martial arts rather than theatre.
Manchester thinks about numbers, acknowledging that a licence is not required for a play, dance, film, indoor sporting event or, indeed, boxing or wrestling, defined as a
“contest, exhibition or display of Greco-Roman wrestling or freestyle wrestling between 8am and 11pm,”
where attendance is 1,000 or fewer. By including the sense that wrestling might be a “display” rather than a contest, it opens up potential for confusion about whether professional wrestling is included. Surely all Greco-Roman and freestyle wrestling is a contest, as that is what actively defines them as different from professional wrestling.
There are difficulties, too, in other areas. I appreciate that this is a devolved matter, but we are told it can be difficult to run shows in Edinburgh, for example, because wrestling is classed as sport for licensing purposes, and therefore performances in theatres and other venues can apparently be very difficult.
What that means in actuality is confusion and potentially dangerous situations. There are examples of licensing schemes causing problems. In Derby, one venue had a licence for live music and sports events, but the council required a temporary licence for wrestling, which was seen as separate from sport. The council refused the licence to the venue, owing to fears about congestion—notably, not about safety or the suitability of the athletes or venue.
Another interesting story emerged in 2011, when the Royal Albert Hall, a venue famous for holding wrestling shows since the beginning of professional wrestling, faced local opposition to its request to add boxing and wrestling to the list of permitted activities. The complaints seemed entirely focused on
“problems with antisocial behaviour, public safety, noise and disturbance, and degradation of the surrounding area.”
Again, safety was not mentioned, but there was the sense, as there is so often, that wrestling appeals to people less socially acceptable to residents than, say, Proms-goers.
A similar opinion seems to be held by residents around Headingley in Leeds, despite the fact that it is a sporting venue. In that case, the council’s licensing committee unanimously refused the application, saying that the event was
“very different in nature and duration to rugby matches held regularly at the venue.”
Wrestling Resurgence, a midlands-based promoter, sent us the various procedures it puts in place when obtaining a licence from Nottingham City Council—specifically, that a medic must be present—but argued that
“some form of ‘fit and proper persons’ test should be in place for prospective promotions, similar to ownership tests in football, or that at minimum some basic standardised requirements put in place.”
The company highlighted the disparity in licensing requirements, saying:
“In Nottingham, where we run events, it is a requirement that wrestling event organisers ensure a medical professional is present at all times during a performance. This is something that is not required in Leicester.”
We certainly think that medics are a must, but, as Wresting Resurgence says,
“A national approach to licensing would be very welcomed.”
It is quite right—it would.
My hon. Friend is making a powerful speech, and I am proud that she is the vice-chair of the APPG that I proudly co-chair. On Monday, I attended a very special conference at Loughborough University with Professor Claire Warden, focusing on concussion in professional wrestling. The point about licensing was raised time and again, as was the utmost importance of having a registered professional medic available at events. That should be part of the requirements, given the nature of the sector and performances, because concussion is likely. That is why such provisions are vital. Does my hon. Friend agree?
I could not agree more. I know that British wrestling is doing a lot of work with the Rugby Football League, for example, on concussion protocols. Unfortunately, despite the pre-determined nature of what happens in a wrestling ring, injuries and accidents are common, so medics should be there to make sure that such risks can be mitigated as far as possible.
The evidence I mentioned fed into the APPG’s inquiry and our recommendation that:
“For any sized promotion, having even limited safety measures in place should be part of the key requirements for running an event, either through requirements to use council property, the TENs licence or a governing body and in the absence of the latter, we recommend that the Home Office brings forward proposals to broaden TENs licence guidance to include health and safety and other minimum standards protocols for wrestling suppliers. We recognise that the legislation is different in Scotland and Northern Ireland, but we request that both devolved administrations assess whether their current licencing rules adequately cover wrestling promotions”.
In June 2021, we wrote to the then Minister of State at the Home Office, Lord Stephen Greenhalgh, to seek his assistance with the implementation of the recommendation in the APPG’s report, which was welcomed at the Dispatch Box by the Government. We asked about the possibility of widening the temporary events notice licence guidance to include health and safety, and other minimum standards protocols, for wrestling suppliers, and sought guidance on arrangements for Scotland and Northern Ireland. The APPG followed up on the letter, but to no avail, so I am delighted that the Minister will be able to update us today on what progress there has been and what plans might be in place.
I hope the Minister can also demonstrate a degree of updated thinking. Cam Tilley, who wrestles under the moniker Kamille Hansen—and who is a former researcher in this place—pointed out to us, through the dissertation that she has just finished on related issues, that these matters have already been discussed in this House. In the 1960s, questions were posed about the prohibition of wrestling performances by women, with the reply that there was no evidence to suggest that the issue was widespread enough to merit action and that this was ultimately a matter for local authorities to decide on as part of their licensing powers. However, London County Council had already fallen into the mode of effectively banning women’s wrestling in venues that it had licensed in the previous decades.
In 2002, during a debate on what would become the Licensing Act 2003, the other place was told:
“we know that boxing and wrestling and their audiences present a significant issue with regard to public safety. As the noble Baroness said, the relationship between wrestling and its audience is particularly engaging, and its showmanship can engage the audience very directly. But, as has been known for many decades, boxing also engages passions. From time to time, boxing bouts have aroused as much vigour in the audience as in those participating in the ring—in some cases, rather more than occurs in the ring.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 12 December 2002; Vol. 642, c. 391.]
Wrestling and boxing are far from the same; I speak as someone who has now been to multiple wrestling shows, large and small. That is not to say that boxing is always violent or problematic, but the lumping together of boxing and wrestling for licensing purposes has certainly caused problems. Wrestling has no concussive intent—although, as my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd said, of course concussive injuries occur—whereas the sole intent of boxing is to knock out the opponent. To conflate the two for licensing purposes makes very little sense.
We were told that some years ago that Tower Hamlets turned down wrestling events on advice from the local police, who had taken a decision based on boxing events. Similarly, we were told that in the past inter-promotional wars were waged between those wrestling companies that had clocked the importance of boxing-related restrictions on a licence and those that had not, with one company forcing another to forfeit a licensing opportunity.
The constant association of wrestling with boxing is deeply problematic. The concern is always that the local licensing process is so complex and likely to lead to rejection that wrestling shows are occurring around the country in unregulated venues or without licensing. We in the APPG would like to see some consistency in approaches to licensing, enhanced confidence for promoters so that they can hold a show, and certainty for all about how wrestling should be categorised by local authorities and what the requirements are or should be. I hope that the Minister can begin to set out that pathway to clarity for us today.