Lord Goddard of Stockport (LD)

I support the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Bolton, especially after Saturday’s result between Bolton and Stockport County—thereby hangs a tale. I was following the thread from the noble Lord, Lord Markham, really well until he mentioned that every game is competitive. Ipswich Town supporters would not agree with that this season. The evidence suggests that is not the case. If we look at leagues across Europe, they have jeopardy. There are last games of the season where relegation and promotion come to the edge. It is not the be-all and end-all. It is right that you need a fairer distribution than this endless three up, two down, three down, and that money needs to go further down the pyramid to encourage further clubs to be able to compete. It looks as if the three that came up this season are going to go down. If that continues to happen, it will have a detrimental effect on the Premier League—it must have. It gets more and more difficult every year to sustain. The Brightons and the Bournemouths have burst through, as have other teams, and they are managed really well. But there are unintended consequences if we do not look at these things in totality and just isolate them. If we say, “Leave the parachute payments alone—everything is all right with it”, that is not making progress, and we need to make progress. That is why we need to look at this within the bigger picture. It is not in the Bill but it needs looking at.