FIFA

Debate between Stephen Phillips and Damian Collins

Wednesday 10th June 2015 Westminster Hall

[Stephen Phillips (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship for the first time in this Parliament, Mr Streeter. It is impossible to speak in this short debate, even with the exhortation that we should be brief, without paying an appropriate tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Damian Collins) for having taken up this campaign and having the courage to run it when the rest of us, and indeed the Government, had frankly dropped the ball. He deserves considerable credit not only from football fans in this country, but from football worldwide for bringing this to the forefront of the considerations of those who love the beautiful game. The Sunday Times’ Insight team and “Panorama” also deserve credit for their investigations, which should have led to action much earlier.

It is also impossible to speak in this brief debate without expressing the genuine joy felt, at least among Government Members, when my hon. Friend the Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch) was absolved of the sins to which my hon. Friend the Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire (Jesse Norman) referred and promoted to Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. She will do a fantastic job if she is anywhere near as successful in her new role as she was when she was running women’s football in her constituency.

How have we reached this position in relation to FIFA? The answer is simple: it is what happens when a gentlemen’s club that was designed a long time ago to run the game of football worldwide meets the billions and billions of pounds that now wash around in the game. Despite all the publicity that has surrounded the corruption for so long, it is apparent that FIFA is no longer in possession of the necessary structures to run the game in a transparent and anti-corrupt way in the 21st century.

[Damian Collins]

Jérôme Valcke, FIFA’s general secretary, announced today that the bidding process for the 2026 World cup has been suspended. Does my hon. and learned Friend agree that even FIFA has now recognised that its systems are completely flawed and corrupted?

[Stephen Phillips]

I agree with my hon. Friend. The announcement is extremely welcome. If there is time, I will discuss the bidding processes for the 2018 and 2022 World cups.

It is important to recognise that we are sitting in the House of Commons in the United Kingdom. This House holds the Minister to account and the Minister can influence the Football Association and the other home nation associations, but she is not ultimately responsible for FIFA. All that we can do in this place is try to shine a light on what has gone on, raise the issues and seek to persuade the Minister that she and the Government can do more to ensure that the game is governed well not only in this country, but elsewhere in the world through international bodies. In that light, I venture to suggest to the Minister that the Government need to do certain things that they have not done in the past or at least have not done effectively.

The first is that better effort needs to be made at governmental level between the Minister and her counterparts in Europe, to whom I know she has now written, regarding the actions that they take regarding their football associations. The English FA is widely regarded in FIFA as pandering to this Parliament and to the media, in a way which other football associations are not. That is a reflection of the fact that the English FA and the associations of the other home nations do a good job, they are held to account through the Government, through this House and by the media, and they are, therefore, answerable to those whom this is actually about at the end of the day: the fans. That is not necessarily the situation elsewhere. In her reply, the Minister needs to indicate what actions she is taking with other Sports Ministers across Europe, and indeed the Commonwealth, to hold their football associations to account, so that ultimately the global body that is FIFA is held to account.

I also suggest that the Minister make clear the Government’s position on the continuing presidency of Sepp Blatter—because he is still the president. I am tempted to and will refer to FIFA as a “Sepp-pit” of corruption—[Hon. Members: “Boom, boom!”] Indeed. Sepp Blatter must step aside now. My hon. Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe suggested that others could come in to run the organisation in the interim. That would be welcome. That needs to be the Government’s position, and the Minister needs to make it clear today that that is the Government’s position.

My hon. Friend also referred to the Serious Fraud Office, which does seem to have dropped the ball. I asked an urgent question in the House on FIFA in the first week of this new Parliament about the steps that were being taken in conjunction with the Attorney General to ensure that the corruption that has been endemic in FIFA for so long is properly investigated in this jurisdiction. It is perfectly clear that it can and should be investigated here, not least because some of the allegations made in the 161-page indictment filed by the United States Department of Justice make it clear that some of the corrupt behaviour probably took place here or in places where we could take action here. If we have dropped the ball, it seems that others, in particular the SFO, have dropped the ball regarding investigations and potential prosecutions. That must be remedied and the Minister must describe precisely what is happening.

I know that the Minister feels passionately and strongly about this issue and that she is doing a good job behind the scenes. I want to hear how she is diverting the relevant rivers to cleanse the Augean stables of corruption that has grown up around FIFA in Switzerland. I look forward to her response.