Mr Bayo Alaba

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Sir Desmond. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Camborne and Redruth (Perran Moon) for securing this really important debate. His important work as a rugby coach and a key stakeholder within his community is to be commended. I come from a football and track and field background, but I have always respected rugby: the organisation of the clubs, what the sport does to the community and how it empowers young people. Coming from my background, I have always had significant respect for that community. I am extremely proud to be here to talk about grassroots rugby. In my community, we have some strong local rugby clubs, including Westcliff, Southend rugby football club and Rochford Hundred rugby club, which I want to talk about today. Rochford Hundred has a positive impact across Southend and Rochford. I have had the pleasure of meeting Ray Stephenson, the president of the club, and Steve Maguire, the chairman. When I have been down to see the team in action on club days, I have noticed how collegiate it is and how many people in the community come together across various age groups—young and old, male and female. That is a true representation of what a sporting club does and what it means to a community. I cannot commend enough the passion and enthusiasm that these guys have shown in how they run the club and have faced the challenges that they have conveyed to me, so I want to say a massive thank you to those two gentlemen for their hard work. Not wanting to remain anonymous, Rochford Hundred has brought to my attention its deep concerns about the disconnect between the RFU, community clubs and the council. As hon. Members will have seen, the RFU chief executive received a sizeable bonus of £353,000 as part of an executive-approved long-term incentive plan, on top of their basic salary of £742,000. However, the RFU also suffered a loss and had to make redundancies so, on the face of it, that organisation is not flush with cash. Clubs such as Rochford Hundred continue to struggle during difficult times. Had the clubs and the council had more oversight, there would have been sufficient checks and balances to stop that decision. This is just one example where the RFU executive has made decisions that do not align with or support grassroots rugby clubs like Rochford Hundred. I urge the Minister to review the governance structures of the RFU, so that it is compliant with the statutory bodies that regulate it, and better support grassroots rugby clubs.