L

Lord Hayward (Con)

Speaking in the House of Lords on 9 December 2024

Debate

Football Governance Bill [HL]

Contribution

My Lords, I will follow on from a comment by the noble Baroness, Lady Brady, on the contribution made by the men’s game and men’s clubs to the women’s team in the same club. The noble Lord, Lord Addington, and I worked with others to ensure that the women’s rugby tournament was brought to this country next year. We are pleased to say that we were successful in doing that, but it needed assistance from the Government and it received a grant. The Minister has, on a number of occasions, referred to the levy being proportionate, and I have been critical of her on this. It is important that an indication is given as to whether money paid by a football club—let us take West Ham as an example—to support the women’s club will be taken into consideration by the regulator when assessing what payment should be made overall to the levy. There would be a serious danger that, if that money is included in the regulator’s assessment of what is proportionate, football clubs will, quite naturally, reduce the amount of money that they give to the women’s game.

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