Lord Goddard of Stockport (LD)

My Lords, I will be reasonably brief. The noble Lord, Lord Burns, covered most of what I was going to say on the technical stuff. We sent the Bill back, and I think everybody agreed it was not perfect. Then we got this list of amendments back, and my heart sank at the thought of another 12 hours’ debate on each and every one of them. The only person whose eyes lit up was the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, who obviously gets paid by the hour by Manchester City. We are nine months into waiting for the 115 charges result; we are still playing a lot of extra time on that one, but let us park it. I am not sure who is the underdog in the game between Bolton Wanderers and Stockport County, but it will be an interesting encounter. We went over these amendments to try to find fault with them, to pick something out, and to see whether the Government were trying to slide something through. Honestly, they have improved the Bill tremendously, and that is partly because of the slight input from the regulator designate, who has clarified the situation. We were a little bit in the dark before about what we thought the role should be and what it was morphing from and to, but just talking to David and understanding his love of what he is going to do, and hearing the passion with which he speaks about being the regulator, tells me it is in safe hands. I had a number of chairmen, not so much from Championship but from League One and League Two clubs, emailing me, and I said that it is going to be good for the game. That is really where I have always been: at the bottom of the pyramid. The Premier League is fantastic—it will flourish and it will carry on delivering—but League One and League Two clubs, and some of those in non-league clubs, will take a deep breath now and say, “Let’s see this happen”. It will give them that certainty and hope that there will always be something there for them when times are difficult. I have known football clubs that have had to come to local authorities and beg and borrow for assistance. That is a difficult thing to do with public funds, but we did it, and the benefits for the economy, for local councils and for shopkeepers are there now for all to see. The community is all football, and if you had any doubt about that, you would look at this. I have no complaints about Chelsea becoming the world champions, but that was the most ridiculous competition in the most ridiculous place. Any regular football fan seeing two o’clock in the morning kick-offs was the Armageddon that was said would happen to us. It has not happened because we have got our Bill through; we have got our ducks in a line, and we will be able to protect the league that we love and cherish. I wish the Bill well on its way now. We can move forward. If the noble Baroness has nothing to do, she might want to help me out with the employment Bill tomorrow if she is free, because that is another challenging Bill.