Non-league Football

Andrew Bingham Excerpts

Thursday 4th September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Bingham (High Peak) (Con)]

This is an incredibly important debate, because it is really important that non-league football should survive. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire (Jesse Norman) on securing the debate. My knowledge of non-league football goes back to about 1973, when I started watching Buxton, and I wear my Buxton football club tie today with pride. I remember when Buxton won the Cheshire league, and I was a member of the committee that ran the club in the early 1990s. I used to travel to home and away matches.

The thing about non-league football is that it binds communities; it binds towns and areas together. When we used to go to watch Buxton, we used to travel up to Morecambe in the north-west. I can see the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds) in his place, and I can also remember many a famous victory at Bower Fold. I remember an auspicious 3-2 win in which I still reckon that the guys behind the goal got the penalty that won the match, but that is another story.

It was about the community. We used to go to matches, and we used to go into the bar beforehand and talk to the opposing supporters. We used to sit there and chew the fat about the good of non-league football and about how our team was better and their team was worse. It was a day out and it bound the community together. I remember the non-league football annual guide coming out at the beginning of each year, and I would buy my copy and tick off the grounds that I had been to. And people might think I am sad, but I always used to have season ticket No. 1 at Buxton. That is the kind of thing that non-league football does to people.

I recently went with my hon. Friend the Member for North Swindon (Justin Tomlinson)—who I believe is wearing his Swindon Supermarine tie today—to watch that team play, and I was very much reminded of Buxton. I shall also talk about Glossop North End in a moment. This is about local people working together for the good of the community and the good of the club. We see people rolling the ground and marking the pitch. Some of the white lines might not be very straight, but the work gets done, and it is done by local volunteers.

I look at non-league football today and I worry. I remember the day when Goole Town came to play Buxton, and they had Tony Currie playing for them. He looked like he had had a few more curries by then, but it was still Tony Currie. Even then, he had fantastic ball control. I think he still has—I do not know if he is watching this.

[Nigel Adams (Selby and Ainsty) (Con)]

I am sure that Tony Currie will be very grateful to my hon. Friend for that. He was an example of a player coming down from the higher leagues to play in non-league football. I remember watching Goole Town, freezing my toes off, as a youngster. We had a player called Tony Galvin—does my hon. Friend remember him?—who was sold to Tottenham Hotspur for £5,000. That was a huge amount of money for Goole Town. On a more serious point, does my hon. Friend feel that the obsession on the part of the larger clubs to import players from abroad denies that revenue to non-league clubs and denies their players the opportunity to get into the professional league?

--- Later in debate ---

[Andrew Bingham]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. He talks about freezing his toes off. He should try watching Buxton in February, playing on the highest football ground in England. He would freeze more than his toes off, I can assure him. The point he makes is absolutely right. We sold Ally Pickering to Rotherham—I think the fee was about £16,000—and Rotherham then sold him on to Coventry City, for which Buxton received a fee. That brought extra capital into the club. My hon. Friend is right: we now have what Alan Sugar used to call the Carlos Kickaballs coming into the premier league, plugging the gap through which footballers used to go up the pyramid, as well as coming down it. I am afraid that the days of old professionals playing at non-league football clubs are gone, and that is very sad.

[Jesse Norman]

I wonder, in view of the comments about my hon. Friend’s toes, whether we are in fact re-enacting Monty Python’s “Four Yorkshiremen” sketch.

[Andrew Bingham]

I can assure my hon. Friend that it was pure luxury!

We also had cup runs. I mentioned Glossop North End, who got to the final of the FA Vase in 2009. That gripped the town of Glossop. There was a train that went from Glossop, with seven or nine carriages. We got on the train at Glossop and—for those whose geography is pretty good—we got to Manchester after about two hours. Then we had to come all the way down to Wembley. The sense of occasion on that train was fantastic. At the time, I was a member of High Peak borough council. It was the first time I had been to the new Wembley stadium and, regrettably, there were not quite as many people there as there were last night, although we were not far short. Afterwards, we decided to organise an open-top bus parade for the team, even though they had not won the trophy. I remember that the streets were lined with people, and there was a fantastic community spirit. We just do not get that with the glitz and glory of the premier league.

For those who cannot sleep tonight, if they read my profile on any website they will see that I prefer football at non-league level because it is the glory game, the people’s game—call it what you will. That is what football is about. Whether it be Glossop North End or Buxton or New Mills in my constituency, it is all about the proper game of football. The premier league has its place and it does a great job, but I prefer non-league football because of what it does for communities. We hear a lot about local activism and people helping each other. My hon. Friend the Member for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris) has just walked into the Chamber; he has been to Buxton with me, and I am sure he remembers it with fondness.

[Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)]

indicated dissent.

[Andrew Bingham]

My hon. Friend shakes his head, but it is the people’s game, the glory game. It is about the lads and the dads. It does not cost a father and his son £100 to go and watch a match. They can go to a match and have their Bovril and their pie and peas at half time. Anyone who watched non-league football knew that the best pies were at Frickley Athletic, and that Horwich RMI was the place to go for hotpot. We knew all those things; that was what football was all about.

That is why it is crucial that non-league football should survive. As the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) said, it gives young lads who want to play football a chance to rise to their level, and they might make it. They might be another Ally Pickering who goes on to play first division or premier league football. They can play football at their level, and they can play it for love. People can also watch non-league football for love, and they can afford to do so.

The contrast with premiership football is huge. We hear of premiership footballers earning £300,000 a week, but we need to get more money down to the non-league clubs to help support them. I heard the earlier comments about VAT and community amateur sports clubs. In my days on the committee in Buxton, I remember having to wrestle with the vagaries of the tax system and all the rest of it. Many people who are involved in non-league football, particularly lower down the pyramid, are doing it for the love of the game. If we can make it easier for them to run these clubs, it is better for the communities and better for the game.

I know which non-league teams I have watched. I can pretty much name the Cheshire league winning side of 1973—apart from a couple whom I am not sure about. It is in the blood; people find it stays with them. They still look for their local team’s results. It is different with premiership footballers. I notice when Chelsea are doing well because there are a lot of Chelsea shirts about. I am a Manchester City fan and have been for a long time. There are a lot more City fans now than there were when they were playing in the old third division. Non-league football always stays with its fans, which is why its future is incredibly important.

Before I sit down, let me just mention football for people of a more senior age. The Minister will no doubt say this, but only this week we had a walking football match here in London between the Glossop Gentlemen and the Parliamentarians. Again, it is something that gets people involved in the game and pulls communities together. Non-league football is incredibly important and we must do all we can to support it both for us and our constituents. I hope, in a few years’ time, to be able to stand up and remind the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde how, once again, Buxton have given Stalybridge Celtic a good thrashing.