Clive Efford

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr Turner. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Earley and Woodley (Yuan Yang) on securing this debate. I will focus on one area of the proposed legislation: the distribution of wealth around the game. It is not true that anyone wants to destroy the premier league or kill the golden goose. What people want is a fair distribution of resources. Over the past seven years, two of the clubs that have been promoted have been in receipt of parachute payments. It is small wonder that that happens when the average club in receipt of parachute payments receives £49 million, while a non-parachute-payment club gets £5.4 million. That promotes risk-taking and distortion. No other organisation would accept, as the English Football League does, an outside organisation like the Premier League providing resources that distort the competition. That is why we need a regulator. We have to stop that risk-taking. Another point that our legislation must address is the separation of clubs from their assets. The previous owner of Charlton Athletic, my local side, now owns the ground and the training ground. We have to find a mechanism that could bring them back to the clubs.