Football Governance Bill

Debate between Rosie Winterton and Kevin Brennan

2nd reading
Tuesday 23rd April 2024 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I also broadly welcome the Bill. May I add the members of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee to the list of people whom the Secretary of State praised? I was a member of that Committee until the end of last year, and I am glad to see several of its members in the Chamber for Second Reading.

It is a pleasure to speak directly after my hon. Friend the Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Dame Tracey Crouch)—I think I can call her a friend after all these years. I commend her for her work in this area and the terrific speech that she has just delivered. I found myself agreeing with pretty much everything that she said. I know that we are in favour of replays, but it would perhaps be wise of me not to repeat everything she said, so I will try not to, although I commend her for what she had to say.

There are still some who question whether Parliament should be regulating in this area at all. Why should we legislate to regulate football? After all, we do not do that in every sport—although, as the hon. Member for Worcester (Mr Walker) pointed out, there is perhaps a strong case for doing so in rugby union after what happened to his local club and other English premiership rugby clubs. However, in reality, Parliament has a long record of legislating specifically in lots of different areas of football. In fact, my private Member’s Bill—the Unauthorised Entry to Football Matches Bill—will have its Committee stage on 8 May, and will, I hope, given its widespread support, make its way into law if we have time before a general election is called. There is a long record of football-specific legislation, so this is not that unusual. Football plays such a huge part in our culture.

Let me say, as the Member of Parliament representing Cardiff West, that although we talk about the English football pyramid, it includes Welsh clubs of course, and has done for well over a century. Football is a huge part of our culture in Wales. In fact, a lot of hon. Members will not know that it is the most popular sport in Wales—more popular even that rugby—helped greatly by the success of our Welsh men’s national football team in recent years, including their reaching the semi-final of the Euros.

Of course, as hon. Members have pointed out, we would not be legislating if football had demonstrated the ability to regulate itself, which many of us—including the late Alan Keen, whom I am glad got a mention in the speech of the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford—have called on it to do for many, many years. It is telling that the Bill is now widely welcomed in almost all tiers of football except, as has been mentioned, the Vanarama national league and the higher echelons of the premier league. I completely acknowledge not only that the premier league is the world’s most successful club competition, but that its existence has brought benefit down the football pyramid.

In the first 25 years of the premier league’s existence, its revenues grew thirtyfold while revenues in the second, third and fourth tiers grew more than tenfold. That is the nub of the issue: if we go on as we are without effective redistributive methods, the inevitable consequence is that that the gap between the top and lower tiers would gradually make the pyramid untenable and unworkable. Without a long-term viable pyramid, football at the top will become even more of a cartel than it currently is.

The Premier League’s chief executive told the Culture, Media and Sport Committee earlier this year, that he was

“totally accepting of the Bill and the regulator coming in after that Bill.”

As the Bill progresses we should bear that comment in mind, which he said on the record to the Select Committee. We should hold the Premier League to that.

As we have heard during the debate, football should be about competition. Business should be about competition, and regulation is about helping to promote fair competition. That is the role of Parliament, Government and the state in this sphere. In the absence of an agreement between the Premier League and the English Football League, the backstop power of the regulator is an essential tool to ensure fair competition, and so that smaller businesses are not ultimately wiped out by the gradual concentration of resources at the top of the game and the impossibility of making progress in the game without taking the sorts of risks that undermine local clubs, and ultimately led to a number of situations that we have heard about. I do not see how Ministers will be able to convince right hon. and hon. Members that that is possible without the regulator having any powers to deal with pyramid payments. As we have heard, the Government’s own White Paper acknowledged the distorting impact that they have on competition. If the Bill is about fair competition, that has to be dealt with.

I want to mention my own club Cardiff City—hon. Members would not expect anyone not to mention their own club. Its stadium is located in my constituency and its recent history has contributed to some of the clauses in the Bill, particularly around fans’ rights. Cardiff City has been very successful during my 23 years in Parliament. It has been in the premier league twice, reached the FA cup final, and lost to Liverpool on penalties in the league cup final, but as is well known, some years ago a new owner, Vincent Tan, decided to change the club’s colours from the traditional blue to red, believing it to be a colour that brought good fortune. If hon. Members can imagine, for a football club universally known as the Bluebirds, the switch to red was somewhat problematic for the fans.

I welcome the fact that the owner changed his mind, and that the Bill would not allow that sort of thing to happen without the involvement of the fans. I can confirm that Cardiff City football club welcomes the Bill. I thank the club’s director Steve Borley, who wrote to me about the Bill. He said that

“the game’s fractured governance model and the inequitable distribution of finances”

is increasingly putting the game at risk. That is why the Bill is so important.

The Bill does not make any reference to the players. That is a missing part. The players’ union, the Professional Footballers’ Association, wrote to hon. Members about that, to say:

“As drafted, there is currently no reference to players within the Bill. We think this is a significant omission”.

I would like to hear from the Minister why that is the case, whether the Government would consider the representations from the players’ union to ensure appropriate references to them in the Bill, and reassurances about some of the existing structures that protect the rights of players, which the union is concerned about.

No one here wants to damage the premier league. I simply want my club, Cardiff City, to have a fair chance of playing in the premier league again. I hope that the Bill will go some way—hopefully improved, strengthened and amended—to ensure a healthier future for football.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I call the Chair of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee.

Points of Order

Debate between Rosie Winterton and Kevin Brennan

Tuesday 16th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I thank the hon. Lady for her point of order and for giving me notice of it. I assume that she did inform the Minister that she intended to raise it.

Obviously, Ministers are responsible for their own replies to Members in Delegated Legislation Committees, as they are in the Chamber. I note that the hon. Lady said that the Minister did her the courtesy of writing after the event, but I think we would all believe—and it is certainly my view—that Ministers should have all the relevant information to hand when responding to a debate. The Leader of the House is here and has clearly listened carefully to what the hon. Lady has said. I am sure that she will take that point back, as will others on the Treasury Bench.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

Further to that point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I can tell the House that this is not an isolated incident in statutory instrument Committees, but surely it is not good enough, because the Ministers who are answering questions about an impact assessment have signed that impact assessment and dated it to confirm that they are responsible and fully aware of its contents. If Ministers are indeed signing off impact assessments on statutory instruments and presenting them to Committees without knowing the contents, that is an extremely troubling revelation.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I note the point that the hon. Gentleman has made. Let me say again that this is up to individual Ministers; we cannot test them from the Chair before they respond to a debate on a statutory instrument.

Business of the House

Debate between Rosie Winterton and Kevin Brennan

Tuesday 16th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I call Kevin Brennan.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

Given that the Chair of the Backbench Business Committee is not present and that the announcement has an impact on Thursday’s Backbench business, can the Leader of the House give us any information about the timing of the debate? Will there be a timetable motion, as there would be if the business were taken in a Committee upstairs—probably allowing an hour and a half in normal circumstances—and why has the Leader of the House decided that it should be taken on the Floor of the House rather than upstairs?

Point of Order

Debate between Rosie Winterton and Kevin Brennan

Thursday 9th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. In an exchange earlier with the Leader of the House, I raised the asylum case of a constituent of mine whose husband was executed by the Iranian regime. Not many things shock me in this place, but I was genuinely shocked that the Leader of the House—quite rightly doing what she does to defend Government policy—failed to even emote a simple scintilla of sympathy about the situation that my constituent has been placed in. Is any mechanism available under the Standing Orders by which the Leader of the House might be able to come to the Dispatch Box and express sympathy, and perhaps even do what she has done for other constituents by offering to take the case to the Home Office for further scrutiny?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

The Leader of the House is at the Dispatch Box and clearly wishes to respond, so I will first ask her to do so.

Employment and Trade Union Rights (Dismissal and Re-engagement) Bill

Debate between Rosie Winterton and Kevin Brennan

Friday 22nd October 2021 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I hope it is a point of order and does not just disturb the debate.

[Kevin Brennan]

At what point does a debate on Second Reading, when we should be debating the general principles of a Bill, turn into a Committee debate in which we parse one or two words in individual clauses? I believe that is a reasonable point given how the debate is currently developing.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that point of order. Basically, a Second reading debate is very wide-ranging and hon. and right hon. Members are entitled to raise issues that they feel might be problematic if the Bill were enacted. This is a very wide-ranging debate that on another occasion I am sure the hon. Gentleman would appreciate enormously.

Points of Order

Debate between Rosie Winterton and Kevin Brennan

Thursday 30th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving me notice of her wish to raise this matter. She has set out her case clearly. However, as I suspect she will realise, this is not a point of order for the Chair. If she wishes to pursue the matter further, she may wish to seek advice from the Table Office, but obviously Ministers will have heard what she has said about this distressing case.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Thank you for calling me earlier in business questions. It is a session that Back Benchers greatly value, as it is the one opportunity in the week when they may be able to raise matters. I understand the time restrictions applying to our business on Thursdays, but during the session that we have just had, the Front-Bench exchanges took 16 of the 45 minutes that you had allocated, and it was due to a brilliant effort on your part that so many Members could contribute in the remaining time. Could anything be done to ensure that more Back Benchers who wish to contribute to business questions are able to do so?

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I am sure the hon. Gentleman is aware that there is a feeling that it is quite helpful for colleagues to have a rough idea of when business is starting so that they can be fairly certain of when they need to turn up for debates. I think many colleagues agree on that. So that is why there are firmer time limits for statements and urgent questions. However, I am sure that Front Benchers will take account of the points that the hon. Gentleman has made about the importance of getting Back Benchers in as well. Obviously, business questions are a very important part of the week—I accept that—and we did manage to get most people in today, which was because there were shorter questions and shorter answers. I think we should bear that in mind for the future.