Member

The moment you impose government control of sport in any way, you are in great jeopardy of losing the opportunity to continue to compete in international events. That is at the heart of the existence of the bodies that represent international sport. The most important issue for FIFA, UEFA and the International Olympic Committee is to oppose political interference and political control on the regulation of any sport—and, in the case of football, to oppose rigorously the unacceptable intrusion into the independent governance of sport, which is at the heart of those international competitions. So, it was with no surprise—I say this to my noble friend Lord Jackson—that UEFA threatened to expel us from Euro 2028 before we even started considering the Bill in this House. On what basis did it do that? Because of