Football Grounds (Regulation)

Hugh Robertson Excerpts

Wednesday 8th December 2010 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Sport and the Olympics (Hugh Robertson)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin) on securing this debate and on how he has conducted it. I pay tribute to him for his work on a number of football issues since his arrival in the House, and I join him in paying tribute to his club, which has done exceptionally well. It is a proper community club in every way, and he is absolutely right to pay tribute to the current chairman and his predecessor for their running of it. It is an example of the sort of football club that we all want to encourage, and I wish Scunthorpe the best of luck for the remainder of the season.

Having said that, I remind the hon. Gentleman, as will the hon. Member for Bradford South (Mr Sutcliffe), that the Minister’s powers in this area are limited. I can ask the Football League to re-examine the issue, but I could not sign an order forcing it to, even if the hon. Gentleman convinced me to do so today. The issue concerns not only many of his constituents but supporters up and down the country. As he correctly stated, the current rules go back to the Taylor report, published in the aftermath of the unnecessary loss of life at Hillsborough. He is absolutely right that that tragedy is the backdrop to this debate, and as he will know, many in his party as well as mine feel strongly about the issue. The Minister for Sport who preceded the hon. Member for Bradford South was among those who felt strongly that there should be no return to safe standing.

Having considered the basics of the case, I think that it is now generally accepted that most football grounds, for a vast number of reasons, are safer and more comfortable than they were 15 or 20 years ago, although I understand why many supporters miss the tradition, the feel and the atmosphere that some grounds had before. I checked the injury statistics for the past few seasons collected by the Football Licensing Authority. They suggest that spectators are less likely to be injured at all-seater grounds than at those that retain standing accommodation. I am aware that those statistics rely on self-reporting, which is always a dangerous statistical basis, and therefore might not provide a wholly reliable indicator of the relative injury rates, but I think that it is generally accepted across football that standing still presents a greater risk of injury, although the extent of that risk is open to debate.

Seating also offers higher standards of comfort, as is probably self-evident, and provides spectators with their own defensible spaces, which can only contribute to encouraging families and increasing the diversity of those attending football matches in recent years. I am sure that we all support that. I know that no one is suggesting that we should return to the arrangements in place 15 or 20 years ago, but I am not convinced at this stage that a compelling case has been made to change the policy on standing areas.

[Mr Ellwood]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for the tone in which he is responding to this debate and for acknowledging that the power does not lie with him, but I hope that he will also acknowledge that there were other factors leading to the 1989 Hillsborough disaster. Yes, seating was one, but there were also crowd control issues, and there were no spill-over areas. The many changes that have been implemented and are now displayed every Saturday or Tuesday night mean that standing or seated, we can avoid what happened on that day. I hope that new technology might allow clubs not in the premier or championship leagues to consider piloting that idea in certain parts of the stands.

[Hugh Robertson]

I do not believe that the presence of all-standing areas was the contributory factor at Hillsborough; that is self-evidently ridiculous. A basket of factors contributed to that disaster, including crowd control, as my hon. Friend says. He is also right that technology has moved on considerably during that period. That said, there are also new elements of technology that rely on fans being seated—the police, for example, say that crowd control via CCTV is much easier if fans are seated than if they are standing—so the argument cuts both ways.

As the hon. Member for Scunthorpe knows, our coalition partners previously agreed a conference motion asking for the provision of some safe standing areas to be considered. I remember that the hon. Member for Bradford South and I kicked about the issue, if that is not an unfortunate pun, a year or so ago when we were on opposite sides of the House. At the urging of the hon. Member for Bath (Mr Foster), I have reconsidered the issue, as I promised in opposition we would. I have written to all the football authorities, and we are in the process of collating their responses.

I say gently to the hon. Member for Scunthorpe that he was right to quote the letter from the Football League. As he correctly said, they replied:

“Football League clubs, particularly Leagues One and Two, are evidence that standing at football is safe when managed correctly.”

But the next sentence reads:

“However, we cannot support a retrograde step that would lead to clubs seeking to replace seating with terracing. The Football League strongly supports existing legislation.”

There is a balance to be struck. We are in the process of collating football authorities’ responses. I am keeping an open mind, but to be honest, there is no groundswell of opinion from the football authorities in favour of a change. I think that they are just as scarred by the Hillsborough experience as many of us who are or have been in government. That is a powerful backdrop and should always be so. There is considerable nervousness about moving, giving that backdrop.

[Steve Rotheram]

I think that the Minister would agree that this country has had an exemplary record since the Hillsborough tragedy, but that is not necessarily the case for the rest of the footballing world. Because of all-standing stadiums, there are tragedies all too regularly in which people are crushed to death, and it is obvious that that fear is the backdrop against which my hon. Friend the Member for Scunthorpe has put forward his proposals.

[Hugh Robertson]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention and, once again, for the excellent debate on football that he secured in this Chamber a few months ago. He has put his finger exactly on the issue. The matter is characterised less by people being at either one end of the argument or the other, and more by a balance of risk somewhere in the middle.

I absolutely accept the arguments that the hon. Member for Scunthorpe has put forward, and many people feel that the risk could be safely managed in such a way that retains the traditional feel of football clubs. On the other hand, a considerable body of opinion on the other side of the line would argue that there are a number of reasons why that should not happen. On the balance of opinion, therefore, and given the backdrop of Hillsborough, we must do nothing that could in any way lead to such a tragedy. That, in a nutshell, is the argument about balance that I am trying to sum up.

We have looked at the experience of other countries and will continue to do so. I am aware of the arrangements in Germany, funnily enough, because I attended football matches there when I was serving in the forces in the early 1990s. I am also aware that things have moved on considerably in the 18 or 19 years since then. The hon. Member for Scunthorpe might be interested to know that the Culture, Media and Sport Committee is planning to look at the matter in the new year as part of its wide-ranging inquiry on football governance and intends to visit Germany to look at the experience there, so the matter remains current and is being examined.

With regard to the hon. Gentleman’s football club, to which I once again pay tribute for its achievements, the difficulty is that it has had three years to comply with the requirement. I understand why it does not welcome any sort of financial outlay in the current economic situation, particularly to make a correction that it does not feel is necessary on grounds of safety. However, since Hillsborough there has been a set of basic criteria governing the regulation of football. That has been lifted only once, for Cardiff City, because of a particular set of circumstances.

I can promise the hon. Gentleman today that we will most certainly keep the experience in other countries in the forefront of our minds. It is not a matter that we will review once and then drop. The fact that the hon. Member for Bradford South and I discussed that at considerable length when he was in government and I was in opposition should give the hon. Member for Scunthorpe confidence that it is something that the Government keep permanently under review. There are also pressure groups that ensure that we keep it permanently under review, and we will continue to do so. I will wait until I have received all the responses and then have some proper police advice, so for the moment I am keeping an open mind.

However, it would be dishonest not to tell the hon. Gentleman today that in my view the judgment will very much relate to the balance of opinion, and there is not a groundswell of opinion, from either the football authorities or the police, that would support a change in the legislation. For the moment, I simply congratulate him on securing the debate and on the way in which he has raised the matter. I appreciate the sensible and constructive way in which he has brought the problem forward. Most importantly, I wish his club good luck; it is a fantastic example of what we are looking for in community football. We will keep the issue under review, but I am afraid that I do not think that there is a compelling case at the moment for altering the rules, set against the backdrop of the Hillsborough disaster 20 years ago.