Lord Maude of Horsham (Con)

My Lords, I think there is a severe danger of there being a consensus around the sentiments, at any rate, reflected in this group of amendments. The point has been made by a number of your Lordships that this is what good clubs do. Successful clubs are deeply rooted in, and serve, their communities, act as a focal point for social action and social activity, and can do enormous good. On Thursday evening, I shall go, in hope, to watch Tottenham play in the Europa League. The following morning, I shall attend the governors’ meeting of the London Academy of Excellence Tottenham, which is a brilliant sixth-form academy that serves disadvantaged young people with academic promise from across the community. Its principal business sponsor is Tottenham Hotspur Football Club. Its premises are in the Lilywhite House, which is the office headquarters of the club. It is brilliantly successful. Tottenham, like most successful clubs, is deeply entrenched and embedded in the local community. I therefore have some sympathy when the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, asks about whether this is necessary. The clubs that take their social and community responsibilities seriously because that is what they need to do as part of their success and their obligations—it is part of the debt they owe to the communities they are part of—will not find it a regulatory burden, because they are, as the noble Baroness said, doing it already. While I am generally allergic to new regulatory powers when the case for them is not overwhelmingly proven, I am willing to make an exception in this case.