Football Clubs (Governance)

It is a difficult issue. I am a supporter of one of the supposedly big four—Manchester United, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool—and that is how we and some other clubs attract the big footballers. Implementing that idea would be like turkeys voting for Christmas, but I understand the rationale behind the obscenity of somebody earning such huge sums when the people paying his wages are on a fraction of what he earns a year. I have described the ““Why?””, so the next question is ““How?””. What can we as politicians do to assist? The social value report that I mentioned concluded with several recommendations on how national Government can do their bit. Time constraints prevent me from listing them, but they are excellent ideas worthy of serious exploration, and I urge interested colleagues to take a look at the document. Having made a fundamental commitment to encouraging reform, the coalition Government have not yet revealed how they intend to proceed, but the previous Labour Government published a raft of proposals before the 2010 election. They include making Government support—especially financial support—conditional on co-operation, creating the right framework for better regulation from the top down and grassroots up, and working with governing bodies to enshrine supporters' rights to buy their clubs and/or be represented in the ownership and governance of the club.