Sport: Rugby League World Cup 2013

Baroness Garden of Frognal Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd November 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hoyle]

My Lords, I seek permission to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper. In doing so, I declare an interest as president of Warrington Wolves Rugby League Club, winners of the Rugby League Cup at Wembley in 2009 and 2010.

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

My Lords, the Government are committed to staging the greatest sporting events in the world and the Rugby League World Cup is among them. The coalition agreement makes clear our commitment to the success of the Rugby League World Cup and we are working with the Rugby Football League to that end. Our proposals include financial underwriting comparable to that offered to the Rugby Football Union for its 2015 World Cup.

[Lord Hoyle]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for that constructive reply. Will the Government underwrite the Rugby League World Cup to the extent that it was underwritten by the regional development agencies under the previous Government; namely, to the sum of at least £1.5 million?

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

My Lords, I pay tribute to the noble Lord for his expertise and his longstanding support for Rugby League, as he has already demonstrated to the House. He refers to a letter from my honourable friend Hugh Robertson. In fact, the Northwest Regional Development Agency contracted with the RFL to provide £1 million to support staging the event in exchange for a specified number of games taking place in its region. Due to the abolition of the RDAs, that position is under review. The RDAs have not yet operated their break clause, so the expectation is that at least £500,000 will be honoured, and potentially the full amount. That will be in addition to the Government’s offer of support. In the interests of brevity, I shall not go into the details of that at this stage.

[Lord Prescott]

My Lords, what is the thinking that justifies 40 times the amount of money for a Rugby Union Cup Final as opposed to a Rugby League Cup Final and World Cup Final? The RDAs were offering £1 million, but the Government are now abolishing them. Is not the reality that the noble Baroness belongs to a department that does not have an elected northern member in it, so reflecting the north-south issue, with, once again, disadvantage to the north?

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord. As the daughter of a Lancastrian and a Durham mother, I may possibly stand for the north, but that is perhaps a little far-fetched. The noble Lord mentions the difference between the two fees. The tournament fee for the Rugby Union World Cup was part of the commitment demanded in the bidding process, but there was no such tournament fee for the Rugby League World Cup. In the interest of fair treatment, the Government have said that the underwriting should be pro-rata, with a provision of up to £625,000 should the event not make the projected £2 million profit. That has been agreed with the Treasury and needs to be formally agreed by Parliament. The Rugby League Board is still considering the proposals made by the Government and we await its response, probably early in December.

[Lord Mawhinney]

My Lords, as regards world sporting events, I declare an interest as deputy chairman of England’s 28-team World Cup bid. I thank my noble friend and, through her, the coalition Government, for their willingness to support the guarantees which FIFA required and to which, in all fairness, the previous Government also signed up, to enable our bid to be made. I also thank the Prime Minister for the very active and personal support which he is giving to the bid, the decision on which will be made next week.

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that very constructive and helpful question. I assure him that the Government remain fully behind England’s 2018 bid and will continue to support the bid in any way possible in the build up to FIFA’s decision on 2 December.

[Baroness Billingham]

My Lords, perhaps I may press the Minister further on this matter. We have listened with great interest to her thoughtful replies. Is there not a moral obligation here? We have a situation in which the Rugby League organised sponsorship of £1 million from the RDA and then the RDA is swept away and it is left without support. In those circumstances, I should have thought that the Government, as perpetrator of the sweeping-away, would immediately step in and say, “We will fully underwrite it”—not half of it. I think the Minister must take this back to the DCMS and press much more firmly for fair treatment for a very important sport.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

My Lords, at the risk of incurring the wrath of noble Lords opposite, I repeat that we are not in such pleasant financial circumstances that we can honour all sorts of commitments across the board. The noble Baroness comes up again with the parity of treatment. We recognise that Rugby League and Rugby Union are two different codes of the sport. We are aware that they have some common interests and indeed they have swapped players, although not always highly successfully. The coalition agreement explicitly commits to parity to ensure that the 2013 Rugby League World Cup and the 2015 Rugby Union World Cup are successful.

[Lord Addington]

My Lords, does my noble friend agree that to say that it is a north-south divide is flying in the face of the work of the Rugby League, which has spent god knows how many years trying to penetrate the south to get a participation base? Should it not be encouraged to continue doing so and should not people be encouraged to get out of their laagers?

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

I thank my noble friend for that—in rather more robust language than I would have used. Indeed, Rugby League has a tremendous lot to commend it as a sport. It would be ideal if it could penetrate the south of the country as much as the north. It is a parallel sport, if you like, to Rugby Union, and both codes of the sport should be equally supported and have equal merit.

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe]

Would the Minister confirm—I welcome this—that £25 million of underwriting is going into Rugby Union but that for Rugby League the amount is only £625,000, which is substantially less than the amount of money that it sought from the RDAs to put in its bid for the 2013 Rugby League World Cup? Will she say why there is such a wide variation? She used the phrase “parity of treatment”. Will she define what the parity of treatment is because, prima facie, it does not look like fair treatment, especially given that the £25 million underwriting for Rugby Union has not changed, yet that for Rugby League has?

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

The noble Lord will be aware that the systems for putting in bids for Rugby Union and Rugby League are different and the government response is in proportion to the requirements for both those bids.

[Lord Glentoran]

Does my noble friend agree that sport across the kingdom and school sport are being seriously cut? Why are these large sums being put forward for very rich and popular sports?

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

My Lords, school sport funding is a debate for a different occasion. However, I assure noble Lords that this Government are fully committed to sport in schools.

[Noble Lords]

No!

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

I assure noble Lords that we are, and when the detail of the proposals that are being put forward for sport in schools comes out, I hope noble Lords will agree that there will be all sorts of opportunities for young people across the country to participate in competitive sport.