The football governance bill

[OutByEaster?]

37 minutes ago, Marka Ragnos said:

What does the government really know about football? 

Nothing.

It's not going to be involved in football - it's going to be involved in protecting the game from itself financially and given the constantly rising prices, financial madness and unwillingness of the Premier league to work with fans on just about anything, it's very much necessary.

[bannedfromHandV]

7 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

It's not going to be involved in football - it's going to be involved in protecting the game from itself financially and given the constantly rising prices, financial madness and unwillingness of the Premier league to work with fans on just about anything, it's very much necessary.

Which is absolutely correct, fine and needed but it’s the government and they make a mess of anything they touch 

[villa4europe]

3 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

Which is absolutely correct, fine and needed but it’s the government and they make a mess of anything they touch 

Was going to say exactly the same 

You can identify any problem within football you want, then you can correctly say that the FA, uefa, fifa are all the biggest pigs at the trough and have no real interest in fixing them but then not a clue how you get to the answer of sending in someone from the government to sort it

What OBE says sounds great but how do you trust these lot to actually do it? It's going to be a man from the government getting corporate days out every Saturday 

[Marka Ragnos]

2 hours ago, OutByEaster? said:

It's not going to be involved in football - it's going to be involved in protecting the game from itself financially and given the constantly rising prices, financial madness and unwillingness of the Premier league to work with fans on just about anything, it's very much necessary.

I hear you, but I don’t think we can say that the regulator is not going to be “involved in football” and is going to be regulating … football. I recognise I’m probably in the minority here. And I am a half-American interloping whelp. 

The Guardian weekly football podcast just told me that “most people agree” that a regulator is necessary, unless they’re people who are “thinking with their own greed.”  So that settles it.

I think we often hear a very simplistic and stereotype–driven description of the views of people who would oppose a government regulator for football. I see some key areas where governmental regulation is not only necessary, but productive. I wish there was a lot more government regulation of weaponry in the United States, for example. I think the pharmaceutical industry, because it connects so closely with life and death situations in people's lives, improves through government regulation. But sport? I just think government has more important things to do. I don't oppose all government regulations, but I also don't think government should be regulating everything. 

Edited March 20 by Marka Ragnos

[JPJCB]

3 hours ago, Marka Ragnos said:

I hear you, but I don’t think we can say that the regulator is not going to be “involved in football” and is going to be regulating … football. I recognise I’m probably in the minority here. And I am a half-American interloping whelp. 

The Guardian weekly football podcast just told me that “most people agree” that a regulator is necessary, unless they’re people who are “thinking with their own greed.”  So that settles it.

I think we often hear a very simplistic and stereotype–driven description of the views of people who would oppose a government regulator for football. I see some key areas where governmental regulation is not only necessary, but productive. I wish there was a lot more government regulation of weaponry in the United States, for example. I think the pharmaceutical industry, because it connects so closely with life and death situations in people's lives, improves through government regulation. But sport? I just think government has more important things to do. I don't oppose all government regulations, but I also don't think government should be regulating everything. 

These are good points at the end that government shouldn’t be involved in sport. But that view does need to be balanced against the outrage that people feel when 1.) there are teams seen to get an unfair advantage purely as a result of money 2.) clubs end up failing with an impact on the local community (see Bury FC as the most recent example).

The case for government intervention is that there’s a public interest in preventing bad outcomes. It’s fine to say that those outcomes don’t need to be prevented. But then people who argue that point (not necessarily you I might add) need to keep quiet when those bad outcomes actually happen 

[foreveryoung]

20 hours ago, Marka Ragnos said:

What does the government really know about football? 
 

Nothing.

They are not going to regulate football, they are going to regulate the finance, ohh, hang on.  

[OutByEaster?]

Here's an example.

At the beginning of the season, the Premier League told fans groups and media that it would ensure that any fixture changes were released with a minimum of six weeks notice. That's enough to let everyone plan their lives and not disrupt the travel plans and working lives of tens of thousands of people.

As of today, the Premier League has not confirmed any of the changes for the 20th/21st April - that's 30 days away - four and a bit weeks. our game against Arsenal will be moving, anyone can see that, we're in France on the evening of the 18th, we won't be playing on the 20th - but they won't confirm it, they won't give us timings, they're not interested in making the lives of supporters easier. It's getting to the point where it starts to affect not just fans, but the people who work on, in and around football stadiums and those that supply to them.The delay lets the Premier league pick the juiciest fixtures for TV and plan around cup games for maximum TV exposure.

That's exactly the kind of thing I'd expect the regulator to be involved in - the Premier league should be fined for not maintaining its commitment, or fans should be compensated for late changes - we desperately need an outside body to try to put some sort of controls on a league that is so wrapped up in its own greed that it doesn't see the problems under its nose.

[blandy]

2 hours ago, OutByEaster? said:

As of today, the Premier League has not confirmed any of the changes for the 20th/21st April - that's 30 days away - four and a bit weeks. our game against Arsenal will be moving,

Arsenal's at 4:30 on Sunday 14th.

The Bournemouth game, though you're right, it's gonna be on the 21st, not 20th, because we play Lille on the Thursday before, so Bournemouth fans can't arrange their travel, perhaps. It'll be a 2pm kick off, I'd imagine, but they should have set it out by now. It's not on telly.

Yes that kind of disregard for fans is galling and wrong. Personally I'm not at all in favour of a government regulator, I think it's a really bad idea.

Yes there's a problem. No the solution is not a government regulator, IMO.

[JPJCB]

3 hours ago, blandy said:

Arsenal's at 4:30 on Sunday 14th.

The Bournemouth game, though you're right, it's gonna be on the 21st, not 20th, because we play Lille on the Thursday before, so Bournemouth fans can't arrange their travel, perhaps. It'll be a 2pm kick off, I'd imagine, but they should have set it out by now. It's not on telly.

Yes that kind of disregard for fans is galling and wrong. Personally I'm not at all in favour of a government regulator, I think it's a really bad idea.

Yes there's a problem. No the solution is not a government regulator, IMO.

What’s the solution then? 

[OutByEaster?]

4 hours ago, blandy said:

Arsenal's at 4:30 on Sunday 14th.

The Bournemouth game, though you're right, it's gonna be on the 21st, not 20th, because we play Lille on the Thursday before, so Bournemouth fans can't arrange their travel, perhaps. It'll be a 2pm kick off, I'd imagine, but they should have set it out by now. It's not on telly.

Yep, sorry, wrong opponent.

What makes you think it won't be televised? 

The Premier league currently has no fixtures at all scheduled for the 21st April and I'm sure they'll end up with two or three going out live.

[Zatman]

6 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

Yep, sorry, wrong opponent.

What makes you think it won't be televised? 

The Premier league currently has no fixtures at all scheduled for the 21st April and I'm sure they'll end up with two or three going out live.

FA Cup semi final is on that day and also Liverpool will play on the Sunday. Not sure if they will schedule so many tv games after them 2

[OutByEaster?]

4 hours ago, blandy said:

Yes there's a problem. No the solution is not a government regulator, IMO.

I think the solution has to come from outside of the league - they've proven over and over again that they'll abandon absolutely any principle or tradition in favour of money - the only outside agency that would have the ability to do that is governmental I think.

There is a growing gap between the Premier league, and supporters - in terms of treatment, in terms of how the game is controlled and run, its priorities and its aims from both a commercial and sporting perspective and it needs to be addressed - with the league showing no interest in addressing that gap and the FA sidestepped by the Premier league, its hard to see where else pressure can come from.

[blandy]

1 hour ago, OutByEaster? said:

I think the solution has to come from outside of the league - they've proven over and over again that they'll abandon absolutely any principle or tradition in favour of money - the only outside agency that would have the ability to do that is governmental I think.

There is a growing gap between the Premier league, and supporters - in terms of treatment, in terms of how the game is controlled and run, its priorities and its aims from both a commercial and sporting perspective and it needs to be addressed - with the league showing no interest in addressing that gap and the FA sidestepped by the Premier league, its hard to see where else pressure can come from.

I think we agree on the problem. My concern is based around a question, which is “can you confidently give me an example of any government regulator that’s done or is doing a good job?”

[OutByEaster?]

8 minutes ago, blandy said:

I think we agree on the problem. My concern is based around a question, which is “can you confidently give me an example of any government regulator that’s done or is doing a good job?”

Probably not, but you have to make the best of what you're given sometimes - and short of tennis balls and pitch invasions, this is the best hope we have of getting fans voices heard.

[S-Platt]

Whoever brought in the £30 for away tickets needs to have a look at home ticket prices.

Maybe they need to take away the cost of match tickets from any PSR calculation. Afterall a 15k capacity cannot compete with a 75k capacity. 

The financial levels teams work to need to be fairer we all agree its weighted to the help the top teams.

Milking your long standing fan base is wrong need to find that sweet point.

[fightoffyour]

They shouldn't have even scheduled our games on Saturdays following the European ties in the first place when we were big favourites to go through - at least that confirms the correct date regardless of the result there, and you'd already have the times confirmed without a need to change.

I'd be more understanding of that for the next round's ties since we're presumably weaker favourites to go through and PL will want to select the "most important fixtures" for TV at the business end of the season, but conversely we will also be involved in many of those "most important fixtures" so why not just put them on Sundays in the first place?

Edited March 22 by fightoffyour

[JPJCB]

9 hours ago, blandy said:

I think we agree on the problem. My concern is based around a question, which is “can you confidently give me an example of any government regulator that’s done or is doing a good job?”

Just because there are things happening you don’t like doesn’t mean that things would be better if there was no regulation. Ofwat was mentioned earlier in this thread: if you don’t like water quality as it is today try imagining what it would be like if there was no regulation at all. It’s the same with all industries that are regulated: finance, utilities, transport, food- you name it. Sometimes things aren’t perfect but things would be way worse if the regulators werent there.

With football we are currently in that non/loosely regulated world and we can see where the problems are. Fine to say you don’t want to regulate it but what’s your miracle solution to improve things? 

[blandy]

21 minutes ago, JPJCB said:

With football we are currently in that non/loosely regulated world and we can see where the problems are. Fine to say you don’t want to regulate it but what’s your miracle solution to improve things? 

Perhaps my view isn’t clear. I do not believe that the system as it is now (unhindered by anything other than the most token gestures) is good. That’s the first thing. The second thing is that I also do not believe that politicians are best placed to (in the form of appointing a regulator, with a remit set by them) to fix the problems. The third thing is that it’s not incumbent on me to have some “miracle solution”. There isn’t one. However, that also doesn’t mean that I/we collectively as football supporters can’t or don’t see improvements that need to be made.

There’s also a huge difference between (say) water or energy or transport, which 10s of millions of people utterly depend upon to exist and a bunch of entertainment providers who organise and play competitive professional football. The population of the country need, via their government representatives, to control the behaviour of the businesses that provide our water via a monopoly.

I would like to see, for example, much stricter tests for owners. I would like to see limits on ticket prices….all kinds of stuff. After Hillsborough all seater stadia were brought in. It didn’t require a regulator. Some nations ban gambling or tobacco or alcohol sponsorship on shirts etc. it didn’t require a regulator.

There are not only 2 options - a government regulator or no regulator.

Being extremely unconvinced that a permanent government regulator is the right path does not mean I have to propose a miracle solution. I would like to see law that details who can legally own clubs, as is the case with certain other nationally important industries like defence etc. TV ads for fags are banned by law. If gambling is one of the things needed to be rid of, then do the same for football shirt sponsors and so on. I think they already did that for tabs and booze, for example. 

[JPJCB]

22 minutes ago, blandy said:

Perhaps my view isn’t clear. I do not believe that the system as it is now (unhindered by anything other than the most token gestures) is good. That’s the first thing. The second thing is that I also do not believe that politicians are best placed to (in the form of appointing a regulator, with a remit set by them) to fix the problems. The third thing is that it’s not incumbent on me to have some “miracle solution”. There isn’t one. However, that also doesn’t mean that I/we collectively as football supporters can’t or don’t see improvements that need to be made.

There’s also a huge difference between (say) water or energy or transport, which 10s of millions of people utterly depend upon to exist and a bunch of entertainment providers who organise and play competitive professional football. The population of the country need, via their government representatives, to control the behaviour of the businesses that provide our water via a monopoly.

I would like to see, for example, much stricter tests for owners. I would like to see limits on ticket prices….all kinds of stuff. After Hillsborough all seater stadia were brought in. It didn’t require a regulator. Some nations ban gambling or tobacco or alcohol sponsorship on shirts etc. it didn’t require a regulator.

There are not only 2 options - a government regulator or no regulator.

Being extremely unconvinced that a permanent government regulator is the right path does not mean I have to propose a miracle solution. I would like to see law that details who can legally own clubs, as is the case with certain other nationally important industries like defence etc. TV ads for fags are banned by law. If gambling is one of the things needed to be rid of, then do the same for football shirt sponsors and so on. I think they already did that for tabs and booze, for example. 

Thanks- good to see your thoughts more clearly.

I think the difference in our views largely reflects that there is a difference between the law and how the law is implemented. When such a law requires judgment in its application then that is where there is a case for regulation since the law itself will be drafted too bluntly to properly mitigate the bad outcomes it is designed to tackle. 

To take your examples. A ban on standing only in stadiums is easy to implement via law alone- there is relatively little discretion that can apply in its application. A ban on certain people owning football clubs is not very easy to implement by law alone unless you are using something blunt like “can’t have a criminal record”. Once you get into the nuances of what makes someone a potentially “bad” owner (financial affairs, reputation, experience etc) then this is where there is a good case for regulation since it can more effectively make holistic judgements based on those nuances.

You mention that there are bans on adverts for cigarettes. Indeed. And there is also an advertising standards authority policing all kinds of other edge cases. Maybe this is an example of a regulator doing its job well as you asked for earlier?

Anyway, we appear to disagree more about the degree of intervention rather than the type. Though I would note that you don’t like the idea of politicians fixing things and yet most of your proposed solutions (e.g ownership tests) would involve changes to the law which are drafted by, you guessed it,…politicians. Regulators are typically more independent and technocratic than law makers so you might actually prefer that option if you give it a try 

[blandy]

14 minutes ago, JPJCB said:

Thanks- good to see your thoughts more clearly.

I think the difference in our views largely reflects that there is a difference between the law and how the law is implemented. When such a law requires judgment in its application then that is where there is a case for regulation since the law itself will be drafted too bluntly to properly mitigate the bad outcomes it is designed to tackle. 

To take your examples. A ban on standing only in stadiums is easy to implement via law alone- there is relatively little discretion that can apply in its application. A ban on certain people owning football clubs is not very easy to implement by law alone unless you are using something blunt like “can’t have a criminal record”. Once you get into the nuances of what makes someone a potentially “bad” owner (financial affairs, reputation, experience etc) then this is where there is a good case for regulation since it can more effectively make holistic judgements based on those nuances.

You mention that there are bans on adverts for cigarettes. Indeed. And there is also an advertising standards authority policing all kinds of other edge cases. Maybe this is an example of a regulator doing its job well as you asked for earlier?

Anyway, we appear to disagree more about the degree of intervention rather than the type. Though I would note that you don’t like the idea of politicians fixing things and yet most of your proposed solutions (e.g ownership tests) would involve changes to the law which are drafted by, you guessed it,…politicians. Regulators are typically more independent and technocratic than law makers so you might actually prefer that option if you give it a try 

You're welcome.

Your comment on the ASA is fair and a good one. Is an ad fair honest and decent? kind of thing - I'd have no problem if the PL (or the Gov't) appointed someone(s) to adjudicated similarly on club ownership. It wouldn't need to be a permanent role - just someone appointed to address a specific case as it arose. The criteria would need to be set by the PL or if it's a gov't role, by the Gov't. My fundamental concern over a Gov't regulator is that when the remit is wide, and unclear - and in this case it's a sort of "something must be done and a regulator is a "something", therefore that's a solution". Well, no, it's not a solution. It's an idea. Proposals were released by the Gov't to cover what this regulator would potentially have powers to do.

When it comes to the myriad of wider issues, most of them I don't think are or ought to be in the purview of the government. I accept that "Football" (the current authorities and clubs) are not doing a good job of managing all these issues in many cases. It's one of those things where (IMO) mood music is saying "we need a regulator", but my suspicion is that Politics will interfere with any "independent" regulator - appointees will be political favourites, prone to do the bidding of a Tory or Labour leader or Government, and paid a fat fee for being there.