Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what discussions she has had with (a) Cabinet colleagues and (b) others on section 2 of the Football Offences Act 1991.
This Government is committed to preventing violence and disorder at football matches and works closely with stakeholders including the police and football authorities to ensure the police and courts are empowered to tackle football-related violence and disorder.
Section 2 of the Football (Offences) Act 1991 (‘the Act’) creates the offence of missile throwing at designated football matches in England and Wales.
Published data on prosecutions and convictions for offences under section 2 of the Act for the last five years are shown in the table below and can be found on GOV.UK here:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/criminal-justice-system-statistics-quarterly-june-2024
Criminal Justice System statistics quarterly: June 2024 - GOV.UK
Year ending | Prosecutions | Convictions |
June 2020 | 37 | 32 |
June 2021 | 7 | 7 |
June 2022 | 81 | 75 |
June 2023 | 114 | 103 |
June 2024 | 118 | 113 |
We do not centrally collate data relating to the proportion of cases resulting in a conviction under section 2 of the Act that did not have a recorded (a) injury and (b) victim.
We keep all legislation under review, but do not have any plans to reduce the scope of this Act.