Professional Rugby: West Midlands

Robin Walker Excerpts

Thursday 22nd June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

I am very grateful for the opportunity to debate Government support for professional rugby in the west midlands. Last year, I secured what was almost certainly the most closely watched Adjournment debate I have ever had to raise concerns about the dire situation at Worcester Warriors rugby club and to ask Ministers to intervene. I do not propose to detain the House by repeating all the points I made in that debate about the huge value of that club to the community I represent, its passionate following and the role it has played in bringing families and generations together, but all that remains as true today as it was then. It is still the case that locally there is deep hurt about the threat to a key element of the late great Cecil Duckworth’s outstanding legacy to the city. The difference now is that we do not currently have a professional men’s rugby team in Worcester, and that is a matter of great concern to me and to thousands of my Worcester constituents. I remain as determined as ever to bring back professional elite rugby at Sixways, and to see the name Worcester Warriors back at the forefront of rugby union in this country.

Along with the Warriors, we have now seen more of the greatest names in English rugby union enter administration—Wasps and London Irish. In the context of this debate, it is worth noting that the west midlands has gone from having a choice of two teams in the rugby premiership to having none. The only remaining professional rugby union side in the west midlands is Coventry in the championship, and the sustainability of that league is being questioned almost daily.

That is not to say that rugby or even professional rugby is dead in Worcester. It is worth celebrating the ongoing success of the Warriors women’s team, and the remarkable band of local businesses and supporters that have come together to keep them going. It is fantastic that the Warriors women remain in the top flight of women’s rugby—the Allianz Premier 15s—and their victories over the DMP Sharks and Loughborough Lightning and the draw against Harlequins attest to the fact this remains a brilliantly competitive team. I am hugely grateful to Cube International, EBC, Adam Hewitt and others that have made that possible through their sponsorship, and to the brilliant Jo Yapp and Josh Payne, who held things together amid the most difficult circumstances imaginable to ensure that the team could first return to the competition in November last year and then secure its place for next season, as was announced in March. I congratulate the entire team on the example of resilience and true Warriors spirit that they have shown.

That we had a stadium for the Warriors women’s team to play in, and that this team and the men’s team survived the pandemic at all, was partly thanks to the vital support that the Government provided to get sport in general and rugby union in particular through the pandemic. In talking about Government support for professional sports, it is worth noting that without the £600 million sport survival package overseen by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, £88 million of which went to premier rugby clubs, very few clubs would have survived that generational challenge. Nevertheless, we have to acknowledge that, in its aftermath, there remain very significant challenges to overcome.

I do not have time in a short Adjournment debate to run through the whole saga of mismanagement and the journey to administration that we have been through, nor to go into the detail about the very different situation, with the same tragic end result, at Wasps. What is clear is that the financial model of professional rugby union is going through a period of profound challenge, and it is vital that the regulators of the sport show that they recognise the extent of this and take rapid action to address it.

I welcome the commitment that the Rugby Football Union made in the aftermath of Warriors and then Wasps going into administration to keep both academies going and to run them as two different streams going forward. The Warriors academy is a really important organisation, with a fantastic track record of producing international players and some valuable links in local education—many of which I have spoken about in education debates. To be sustainable in the long run, however, it needs a professional club to feed into.

I recognise the pressures on the RFU to treat clubs equally and to stand by the precedents it has set, but I am deeply concerned that its decision in the case of both the Warriors and Wasps that the only way back into professional rugby is to go all the way down to the bottom of the amateur pyramid is self-defeating. It risks removing the prospect of professional rugby from large areas of the country, most notably the west midlands, and disincentivising investment, which is vital in meeting its ambition of growing the game.

Investors who are keen to make a commitment to professional rugby are likely to be deterred by such a long journey to get there, and it seems bizarre that in rugby union—unlike in almost any other sport or sector of the economy—new investors who want to take a business out of administration are treated in the same way as related parties to those who took it in. I query the logic of the RFU’s position that any club that goes into administration should henceforth be treated as a phoenix. Most of us with experience of the business world would understand a phoenix situation to apply when, and only when, the former owners of a business or related parties to them seek to bring a business out of administration, but the current RFU guidelines require any new investor, even when they have no relation to the previous ones, to spend a long period in special measures and with extra supervision. A level playing field for supervision and greater transparency with the regulator is absolutely right in professional rugby, and the saga of the Warriors under the previous ownership very much demonstrates the need for it, but I worry that in creating extra hurdles for new investors to take a club forward and provide the investment to keep a club in professional rugby, the RFU is shooting itself in the foot when it comes to the sustainability of the professional game.

The requirement to go all the way down to the bottom of the amateur pyramid has resulted in the loss of some great names from professional top-flight rugby before, but never before has it denuded a whole region of its premiership representation. With both Wasps and Worcester out of the top flight, we face exactly that.

In the case of Worcester, there is an additional challenge in that we have a strong and well-established amateur rugby side that split from the Warriors when it went professional—another key part of Cecil Duckworth’s legacy to the city. Worcester rugby football club, which was first established in 1871, is alive and well and flourishing at its Offerton Lane home, just up the road from Sixways, but it has no desire to compete for players with any Warriors side on its way back up the pyramid, and while it constantly shows good will to efforts to bring professional rugby back to Sixways, it would understandably be concerned about any route to do so that put it directly in competition with another local team going up the leagues.

The consequences of losing professional men’s rugby union in a community like Worcester are severe. There has been the loss of jobs for players and staff alike, who moved heaven and earth to keep the show on the road during the last season but through no fault of their own have been unable to return to work. There has been the loss of income to the excellent Warriors Community Foundation, which has recently had to announce its departure from Sixways and its decision to move to a more costly city centre location. There are the fans of the professional game who have to travel far further to watch rugby, whether down the motorway to Gloucester or across to Coventry. Fans are united in saying they want the Warriors back, and MPs, councils and local businesses have all come together in stating their ambition to see professional elite rugby return to Sixways as soon as possible.

Recently, at a meeting held at Offerton Lane, Worcester Warriors fans set up a supporters trust with a view to bringing back professional rugby as swiftly as possible. Supporters trusts have played a crucial role in getting many football clubs back into contention, with Wimbledon and Wrexham being notable examples, and many supporters of the Warriors are keen to see if the model can be used in rugby.

The new owner of the club and stadium, Atlas, has itself stated that it wants fan ownership to play an increased role in the future of the club, and I strongly urge Atlas to sit down with the newly formed supporters trust to see how they can work together to achieve this. If a supporters trust can get a share of the ownership at a club such as the Warriors, I hope the Minister will consider how the Government can support them.

It is fair to acknowledge that there has been much concern about the plans of the new owners. Fans, who underwent a deeply traumatic period in the run-up and during the club’s administration understandably want more transparency from the new owners as to their future plans for the stadium and their club.

There has been much debate and huge scepticism about proposals for a rebrand or to take over another local club and bring it to Worcester. For my part, I am clear that we need to see the Worcester Warriors brand maintained, and fans made that abundantly clear to the new owners at the forum they held in February. At that time, they did seem to have listened, and I hope that shortly they will be more forthcoming about what their plans are for building back up to professional rugby in the shortest possible timescale. There have been suggestions of touring sides or demonstration matches, and rumours of concerts and other public events, but fans need clarity and they need it soon.

I remind the new owners and any prospective investor in Sixways of the clear statement by councils—including Wychavon, which is the planning authority for the stadium—MPs and key supporters of the club that the only way development will be approved at or around Sixways will be if it benefits the professional elite sport and the community.

For any investor to put money into rugby, there needs to be clarity about the proposition, and right now there does not seem to be that clarity. With three premiership sides already lost to administration and widespread concerns about the viability of the championship, there are deep concerns about the future of professional rugby in England. To attract new funding, investors in rugby need clarity over the future league structure after a period of turmoil, and that clarity is needed as soon as possible to attract the long-term investment that the game needs. What can the Minister do to ensure that we get that clarity as quickly as possible?

I know that the Minister will say that it is not his job to run the sport and that the RFU and Premiership Rugby Ltd between them have that responsibility, but they need to move swiftly to provide much-needed clarity to show how investors can bring teams into professional rugby and make it sustainable, and to ensure that there is a footprint for professional rugby union across all areas of the country where it has support. In Worcester, there are thousands of supporters—between the Warriors and Wasps, there are tens of thousands of supporters—who want to be able to support and follow the professional game. The game cannot afford to lose them. If the RFU does not act fast to provide a route that enables those supporters to get their game back and their teams back to the top flight, I do not believe that Ministers can stand back.

When I was approached by Worcester City Council with the proposal of adding rugby union to the fan-led review of football, I rejected that proposition, because I believe that the two sports are fundamentally different and face different challenges. The challenge facing top-flight football has too often been too much money and the distance that creates between management and fans. The challenge facing rugby union has been too little money and unsustainable finances. The game of rugby union would benefit from its own fan-led review, and having discussed that with my neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Worcestershire (Nigel Huddleston), the Minister’s predecessor, I know that he has come to the conclusion that that needs to be explored.

The Minister has already given a great deal of time and effort to addressing the future of rugby union in general and the situation of the Warriors in particular. I have been pestering him over a long time on this issue. I have no need to remind him of his commitment to try to ensure that there is a positive outcome for the rugby offering in Worcester, and of my commitment as MP for Worcester and a personal friend of the Duckworth family to secure the remarkable legacy of elite professional rugby that Cecil Duckworth left the city.

I hope the Minister can use his influence with the Rugby Football Union to make clear to it that the current situation is not tolerable. The loss of much-loved, well-supported local sides and the jobs, investment and pride they bring to a community, as well as the inspiration and opportunities they offer to young people, cannot just be treated as par for the course. The Department for Culture, Media and Sport, the RFU and Premiership Rugby Ltd need to work with investors to ensure a future for the Warriors and for professional rugby in the west midlands.

When we debated this situation almost a year ago, it seemed that administration was a route to keeping the club and its assets together, attracting new investment and supporting a return to the top flight. Today, there is a real risk that there will be no top-flight team in Worcester or anywhere in the west midlands for many years to come. After millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money have been invested to support the sustainability of the sport, and all the many community benefits that it brings, that would not be an acceptable outcome.