Football Association Governance

Christian Matheson Excerpts

Thursday 9th February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)]

I do not want to go down the route of legislation to reform football governance, but the FA is supping in the last chance saloon—it has been doing so for a long time. My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) knows a lot about this subject, and I agree with what he says about Greg Clarke. Having met him, I can see that he is a man who has clarity of purpose and determination, and who wants to make a difference. He has asked for time in which to do that, and we should be willing to give him some, but only a little.

[Peter Dowd (Bootle) (Lab)]

Notwithstanding my hon. Friend’s comments, does he acknowledge that the Vote Football fan campaign, the Football Supporters Federation, individual supporters, grassroots organisations, parliamentarians and constituents all want change and reform? Why does he think that the FA believes otherwise? Is it not now so out of touch that there is a need for the external imposition of change?

[Christian Matheson]

I do not think that Greg Clarke is out of touch or that he believes otherwise. He has clarity of purpose, but the structures are inflexible and unbudging.

On the one hand we have the juggernaut of the Premier League, as my fellow member of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, the hon. Member for High Peak (Andrew Bingham) has described it. The league is a success and it attracts the best players. Speaking of which, was it not magnificent to be at Goodison on Saturday to see Romelu Lukaku score four, Mr Speaker? But I digress. The Select Committee was told in a letter that Premier League representatives

“regularly use their position on the FA Board”

and “their financial might” to “maintain their position”.

On the other side are the elderly gentlemen, the 25 life presidents on the FA council, whom my Committee Chairman, the hon. Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Damian Collins), eloquently described earlier. They are known as the blazers, not to be confused with the Glazers, as any Manchester United fans in the Chamber will know. That description reminds me of Will Carling’s famous description of the leadership of the Rugby Football Union in 1995 as “57 old farts”. That was a coarse term, Mr Speaker, but it seemed to move things on, and the RFU has since brought its governance up to date. There are arguments against the Premier League and the so-called blazers, but for me this is about the combination of both, so it is clear that legislation might be the only way of breaking the logjam of self-interest.

If I may digress slightly, there is one area on which I disagree with my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Clive Efford). When the structures at the top are not right, the management below does not fall into place. For example, we know that the FA is failing to regulate both the power of football agents—I am told that the agent exam can be passed by an 11-year-old—and transfer negotiations, leaving the potential for a bung culture. The structures are not right, so the management and the enforcement below is not right.

The problems involving the great club of Coventry City and Sisu were mentioned earlier. Greg Clarke told the Culture, Media and Sport Committee that although there are fit and proper person tests for directors and officers, there is no test of whether someone actually has the ability to run a club, which is another example of management structures not being good enough. During the Select Committee session, I talked about the tentacles of offshore ownership and untraceable money, which the FA is unable to manage. I also mentioned Vibrac Corporation, which used its base in the British Virgin Islands to loan millions of pounds to Everton, West Ham, Fulham, Reading and Southampton between 2011 and 2013 despite a lack of clarity about who actually owns it. A further problem is that the FA has little control over financial matters and appears to rely on little more than signed declarations from clubs or interested parties to say that they are fit and proper, which allows the FA to avoid responsibility. Good governance depends on the right structures at the top and on allowing the management to enforce rules that have been put in place correctly.

Greg Clarke is a good man who will fight hard to achieve his reforms. He has won friends in the amateur game by visiting every county FA in England, but he needs support and I am unsure whether he has that at the moment.