Football Governance Bill (Third sitting)

Debate between Damian Collins and Robin Millar

Committee stage
Thursday 16th May 2024 Public Bill Committees

[Damian Collins]

Q Do you agree that, as Steve Parish said on Tuesday, the clause as drafted puts a far greater onus on the smaller Premier League clubs, for whom the Premier League broadcasting revenue is a much greater proportion of their income?

Tim Payton: The way Premier League broadcast revenue is distributed is fantastically collective. I think it is 1:1.6, so it really helps to keep a competitive balance, which of course Richard Masters was stressing the importance of to all of you. But the regulator is in effect having the powers over the wrong bit of the broadcast income. It is Manchester City, Manchester United and Arsenal’s revenue that must be included, so that we have a progressive system of redistribution, but also a check on where the game is heading.

[Robin Millar]

Q In the previous evidence sessions, we have had explained to us—in quite graphic detail at times—the differences between the leagues, the different challenges they face, the different ways that fans experience the game and so on. First, I am keen to hear from the fans’ perspective what you think those risks are across those leagues. Secondly, are you happy that the Bill addresses those risks, for example, in the way that clubs fail?

Alistair Jones: For the EFL, the precipice between the bottom of the Premier League and the top of the Championship is massively disproportionate to wherever it has been before. The simple fact is that over the 72 football league clubs, there is £450 million of losses just last year alone. That cannot continue—everything has to be sustainable.

For me and for Albion fans, a fairer distribution of wealth and a fairer redistribution of Premier League income would make that difference less between the 20th team and the 21st team in the country. At the moment, over £50 million of turnover is written off more or less overnight, and that is dependent on whether parachute payments are consistent. Also, the lack of competition is a big worry. The bottom three of the Premier League were the top three that got promoted last year, and they have just swapped places. It is more than likely that two of the three will be promoted this year.

Sarah Turner: We would like parachute payments to come under the independent regulator because we think it does make it an unfair competition. You are striving to reach the promised lands, so you will throw everything at it, and it makes owners gamble and spend recklessly, which is what has happened to Reading and many other teams. It is an unfair competition because you are pushing yourself so far to get there. We were relegated because of a points deduction to League One, and we are striving to get back up to the Championship.

Tim Payton: We are here because of the European Super League and the furore. I was in the meeting with the Prime Minister where he said he would “drop a legislative bomb” on it. What I hope you are all doing is passing legislation that means we do not need to throw bombs around but we have a good defensive mechanism in place. The two big threats to the heritage and competitive balance of the Premier League are all the revenue being earned outside of that in the UEFA and FIFA competitions and, as I said before, the relocation of our games. I would urge you to look closely at the suggestions we have made for tightening up in those areas.

Football Governance Bill (Second sitting)

Debate between Damian Collins and Robin Millar

Committee stage
Tuesday 14th May 2024 Public Bill Committees

[Damian Collins]

Q I suppose ultimately, however it is done, we would want the same standards to apply to everyone. Clubs that have a men’s team and a women’s team should be regulated in the same way as clubs that just have a women’s team.

Jane Purdon: There is a proportionality. One of the other bodies I chair is PGAAC—the Professional Game Academy Audit Company—which is the academy quality assurance body. It is a joint venture between the FA, the Premier League and the EFL, and there is proportionality in what we do. We quality-assure all the academies, and we have just started doing the girls’ game as well. We are not taking what we apply to Manchester City to what we apply to a League Two community organisation that happens to run a girl’s elite training centre. It has to be proportionate and you have to make sure that you are adding value all the way.

In fairness, for full disclosure, I have spoken to people in the women’s game who disagree and say that if this if this is coming in for the men’s game, it ought to come in for the women’s game. I look at things like the owners and officers test, which we have written to the Committee about, because we think there are real problems in the drafting. I think that is going to be incredibly onerous for clubs. If you then put that into the women’s clubs as well, many of them who are running on much lower resources, it is an unintended consequence of bureaucracy to what end.

[Robin Millar]

Q I am an MP from north Wales. The Football Association of Wales told me that girls drop out of football at teen age. That is the big cliff edge, and it is principally to do with facilities that are available, as it is a time when that is particularly important. What do you think are the biggest barriers to women participating in football?

Jane Purdon: By the way, hearing where you are from, may I sound a note of congratulations to Wrexham FC? I saw it had an attendance of 9,500 for one of its women’s games—wonderful.

What are the barriers? We need the role models. We have those. Our Lionesses are wonderful. We need infrastructure. We need more, more, more, more, more. It is as simple as that. We need more pitches, we need more people, we need more coaches. I sometimes say to people if you want to know what needs to happen in future, take a walk around your town and count up all the football pitches you come across—the ones down the park, the ones in the school, the ones for the professional football club. Now double that. If we are serious about opening up football to the other half of the population, it will look something like that. So, yes: more, more, more.

There has to be some rate of organic growth in this. We cannot do everything at once. Many of the people looking at this, the people at NewCo, the people at the FA and, in fairness, the Sport Minister, have taken a good interest in this. There is good work happening, but we have a long way to go.