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Lord Pannick (CB)

Speaking in the House of Lords on 17 March 2025

Debate

Football Governance Bill [HL]

Contribution

I will add just two comments, the first on Amendment 35 on the women’s game. It is plainly at a very sensitive stage of development and we would all wish to encourage that development. My concern is that including Amendment 35 might perversely deter some clubs from investing in women’s football, and that would be most unfortunate indeed. In relation to Amendment 36, to which the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, just spoke, this is an exceptionally vague provision: the idea that the regulator should have power in relation to discretionary licence conditions where there is “conduct which it reasonably suspects to be harmful to the interests of the United Kingdom”. This would be very difficult to apply and would lead to all sorts of probably legal arguments on what this means. In any event, it is a power that would be given on the basis of reasonable suspicion. That is most unfair to the clubs concerned, because there might be a reasonable suspicion that is not justified. As always, I declare my interest as a practising lawyer, partly in sports law, acting in particular for Manchester City in current disciplinary proceedings.

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