Brain Injuries in Football

Ian Blackford Excerpts

Wednesday 24th April 2024 Westminster Hall

[Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered brain injuries in football.

The fact that so many Members are present to seek to intervene or speak in this short debate shows the great interest in the topic. The subject of brain injuries in football and concussion, and brain injuries in sport as a whole, has received considerable attention in recent months, but it is an issue we have been familiar with for many years. My wife’s grandfather, George Richardson, who played professional football for Sheffield United and Hull City, died from a brain haemorrhage in 1968 aged just 56. It was widely believed in the family that it was a consequence of heading heavy footballs when playing as a striker in the football league in his youth.

In 1966, famous for the England World cup win, there was also the end of the first domestic season in which injury substitutions were allowed in English football. A report that I read in the Liverpool Echo from that year recorded that 772 injury substitutions had been made, of which more than 10% were made as a consequence of concussion or head injury. The vast majority were for leg injuries—understandable for football—but even then quite a high number of players were taken off for concussion. We can imagine the high bar there would have been at the time, given that understanding of the consequences of concussion and long-term health impacts were not as well understood.

Staying with 1966, five members of England’s World cup-winning team have subsequently died as a consequence of dementia or brain-related conditions. Recently, other well-known England and Scotland footballers, such as Jeff Astle, Gordon McQueen and Joe Kinnear, have also died from brain-related injuries. However, no longer is this just a matter of tragic stories being brought into the public domain of great loss and sympathy for the families concerned; it is now a matter of increasing scientific study, especially in Scotland, with the 2019 field study conducted by Doctor Willie Stewart of the cases of more than 7,000 former Scottish professional footballers, looking at their cause of death against a study of the general population involving 23,000 people.

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. He makes an important point about that field study in Scotland. At the time some people dismissed it, because it was only one study, but what has changed in the intervening years is that there have been studies in other European countries. I would argue that the evidence is now overwhelming. It is not just the high-profile cases that he talked about; thousands of footballers are caught up in this and are in financial difficulty. What we really need, given this understanding, based on the scientific evidence, is to have this type of injury classed as an industrial injury by the Industrial Injuries Advisory Council.

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[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Stuart Andrew)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Rees. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Damian Collins) for securing this important debate. I am under no illusions about the significant interest in the issue among right hon. and hon. Members. The fact that so many colleagues are here for a half-hour debate proves that point.

Brain injury in football is an important issue that touches many people’s hearts. Last September’s Backbench Business debate on the links between football and neurodegenerative disease demonstrated the wide cross-party support and depth of feeling about this vital issue in the House and in wider society. That has been reflected in the many personal stories of constituents that hon. Members have raised.

[Ian Blackford]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for referring to the debate that we had on 14 September. As he rightly says, it was a cross-party debate; I led it with the hon. Members for Moray (Douglas Ross) and for Easington (Grahame Morris). I was very encouraged by the response from the Government Front Bench at that point. Subsequently, on behalf of the three of us, I had discussions with the Industrial Injuries Advisory Council.

There is a recognition of the wealth of evidence that exists, but we now need some help from a Government Minister to get to the next level. The previous Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work—the hon. Member for Corby (Tom Pursglove), who has now moved on—had indicated that he would have a meeting with the three of us. I have been trying to push the replacement Minister by letter: I wrote to her on 18 January and on 13 March. Will the right hon. Gentleman assist us in getting that meeting for the benefit of everyone engaged in that debate and this one, so that we can do the right thing and ensure that more people like John McNamee—a Hibs legend as well as a Newcastle one—do not face the same financial injustice?

[Stuart Andrew]

It was certainly a pleasure to respond to that debate, and I made a commitment to write to the Department, which I did. I was due to meet the Minister for Disabled People yesterday, but I had to spend all day in the Chamber for the Second Reading of the Football Governance Bill. That meeting will be rearranged, and I will be sure to raise the right hon. Gentleman’s request. I will come on to his point about industrial injuries shortly.

The safety, wellbeing and welfare of everyone who takes part in sport is paramount. I also know how important football clubs and players are to all our local communities. The recent examples of dementia-related deaths of former footballers are of great concern to Members across the House and to me as the Minister for sport. It is important to acknowledge that the vast majority of people play sport safely, but head injuries in sport do occur.

Player safety must be a major focus for sport, as we recently highlighted in our Government sport strategy, “Get Active”. More work is still needed to ensure that robust measures are in place to reduce that risk and improve the diagnosis and management of sport-related head injuries at all levels of sport. That should apply during not just matches but training, and there should be provision for both professional and amateur players, as hon. Members have mentioned.

The national governing bodies are rightly responsible for the regulation of their sport and for ensuring that appropriate measures are in place to protect participants from serious injuries. I am pleased to say that positive progress has been made across different sports in recent years. For example, home nation football associations have changed their guidelines to prevent under-11s from heading footballs during training in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, and the FA is co-funding research with the Professional Footballers’ Association to build the evidence base relating to brain injuries in football. It is not just national governing bodies contributing to improvements in player safety; players’ associations such as the PFA also play a valuable role in supporting professional players and providing short and long-term support to those affected by sporting injuries.

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[Stuart Andrew]

I would be more than happy to do so. In fact, I suggest that it is probably sensible to do so before we do the roundtable, so that I can reflect what I hear from the families.

There has been some discussion of the industrial injuries disablement benefit. The Department for Work and Pensions provides specific support for that benefit and the Industrial Injuries Advisory Council is the independent scientific body that will make recommendations. I know that many Members feel strongly that the council should explore professional footballers’ access to the benefit. My understanding is that the council is currently considering any connection between neurodegenerative diseases such as dementia and the possible effects of repeated head injuries sustained during a career as a professional sportsperson. It needs to give further consideration to the evidence before it can make a decision and will publish its findings when the investigation is complete. It would be premature for me to speculate on how that will progress, but I will definitely raise the matter with the disability Minister.

[Ian Blackford]

I am grateful for the Minister’s remarks, because many of us feel that the research is now overwhelming. The role that we can play on a cross-party basis, with his assistance, is to demonstrate to the advisory council that an early determination would be welcome, particularly in the light of the hardship that so many footballers experience as they struggle with the impact of brain injury. We cannot allow this to be dragged out ad nauseam. We need to get to a conclusion and make sure that footballers get the help they deserve.

[Stuart Andrew]

I will try to reflect the right hon. Gentleman’s comments as accurately as possible at my meeting with the disability Minister.

It is important to highlight that the Government are leading work on brain injuries in sport, and specifically on concussion. As part of that, my Department has worked with interested parties to develop the first ever single set of shared concussion guidelines for grassroots sports across the UK. The guidelines, which were published last April, were developed by a panel of UK and international experts in the field of sport-related concussion. They build on the world-leading work in Scotland that hon. Members have mentioned.

We are grateful for the support of Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish colleagues in expanding the remit of the new guidelines to cover the whole UK and their full use for everyone involved in grassroots sport, from school age upwards: participants, coaches, volunteers and parents, as well as those working in education settings and healthcare professions. Through the guidelines, we want to encourage more people to enjoy the benefits of being active and playing sport. We hope that they will be a useful tool in reducing the risks associated with concussion. At all levels of sport, if someone is suspected of having concussion on the field of play, the overarching message, as my hon. Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe said, is “If in doubt, sit them out.”

Evidence-based research is an important component of ensuring that sport is made as safe as possible. My Department has therefore established a research forum to look at concussion in sport. That group brings together key academic experts with experience in traumatic brain injury, neurology and concussion to identify the priority research questions around sports concussion that still need to be addressed for the sporting sector. It is now formulating a report to identify the priority research questions, which is expected to be completed this year. Alongside that, our Department has established an advisory panel with the aim of identifying tech innovations that can help with concussion in sport.

Separately, the Department of Health and Social Care is formulating the Government’s new strategy on acquired brain injury, including dementia. Our Department is feeding into that process to ensure that those who play sport are represented in the gathering of evidence. We remain committed to working with the sector to make sport safe and enjoyable for everyone, including through technological solutions and the prevention of concussion.