Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lisa Nandy and Yuan Yang

Thursday 27th February 2025 Commons Chamber

[Yuan Yang (Earley and Woodley) (Lab)]

8. What steps she is taking to help improve the financial sustainability of English football clubs.

[The Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Lisa Nandy)]

We are proud to have introduced the Football Governance Bill, which will establish an independent football regulator to protect the financial sustainability of English football clubs, and we recognise the key role that lower league football clubs play at grassroots level.

[Lisa Nandy]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for the work he has done in supporting his local clubs. Across all sports, Sport England invested over £57,000 in Wolverhampton West in 2023-24. The Government are committed to continuing to support local clubs through investment in the multi-sport grassroots facilities programme, as well as through Sport England, which invests over £250 million of lottery and Government funding each year.

[Yuan Yang]

The Sport Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley South (Stephanie Peacock), was kind enough to meet me and Reading football club fans last year to discuss the urgent need for an independent football regulator. Since then, the legislation has been held up in the other place by Conservative peers, and I was appalled to hear that the Leader of the Opposition sees an independent regulator as “a waste of money”. Fans and staff in Reading will be able to tell the Secretary of State the importance of the need for a regulator, so will she visit the stadium in my constituency to meet them in person?

[Lisa Nandy]

I would be delighted to support my hon. Friend as she continues to fight the good fight for football fans in her constituency. Like her, I was appalled by the Leader of the Opposition’s comments. The independent football regulator began life under the last Government; it was in the Conservative manifesto, it was in our manifesto, and we were elected to deliver it on behalf of millions of football fans. I very much hope that the right hon. Member for Daventry (Stuart Andrew) will disassociate himself from the Leader of the Opposition’s appalling comments.

Gaza: BBC Coverage

Debate between Lisa Nandy and Yuan Yang

Thursday 27th February 2025 Commons Chamber

[Lisa Nandy]

No.

[Yuan Yang (Earley and Woodley) (Lab)]

I thank the Secretary of State for her very clear statement. The bigger picture that the Opposition are missing here is that the British media at large have greatly suffered from a lack of access in Gaza during the deadliest war on record for journalists. My former colleagues have variously been denied entry and had unnecessarily prolonged and risky exits, and our Palestinian contributors have been stuck in a living nightmare. Will the Secretary of State ensure that she continues to safeguard British media interests and their reporting abroad and work with Foreign Office colleagues to enlarge access for journalists in Gaza?

[Lisa Nandy]

I am very happy to give my hon. Friend that assurance. As I said in answer to an earlier question, my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary has raised this issue, and he and I are working very closely together on it. My hon. Friend will be aware that the BBC World Service plays a critical role in ensuring that free and fair information is available all over the world, which is why we rightly expect the highest standards from the BBC.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lisa Nandy and Yuan Yang

Thursday 17th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Yuan Yang (Earley and Woodley) (Lab)]

8. What steps she is taking to support the financial sustainability of English football.

[The Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Lisa Nandy)]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising this incredibly important issue. Football is one of our greatest exports and is a source of joy to people across the country. For too long, however, robust protections have not been in place to ensure that every town, village and city can share in that success.

May I take the opportunity to pay tribute to the former Sports Minister Dame Tracey Crouch for her work leading the fan-led review of football governance? The Government committed in the King’s Speech to the football governance Bill and we expect to introduce it shortly.

[Yuan Yang]

I associate myself with that tribute and thank the Secretary of State for her reply. My constituency is the proud home of Reading football club, which managed to stay up last season against the odds but which has been the victim of financial mismanagement by absent owners. We desperately need the Government’s football governance Bill, which will set up a regulator to safeguard clubs like Reading and prevent future abuses. Will the Minister meet local fans and me to discuss what we can do to protect the club?

[Lisa Nandy]

The Sports Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley South (Stephanie Peacock), will be absolutely delighted to do so. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Earley and Woodley (Yuan Yang) and to the three Reading MPs for their work to protect something that is so incredibly important to their town. I know from my experience of the work we had to do to save Wigan Athletic that when a football club is under threat from mismanagement or poor ownership, it is absolutely devastating for the generations of fans for whom the club is part of their civic inheritance. We look forward to introducing the football governance Bill without any further delay and to working with my hon. Friend and colleagues to ensure that we introduce the strongest possible protections to put fans back at the heart of the game, where they belong.