English football’s new independent regulator will have the power to block clubs from joining a future breakaway European Super League thanks to the implementation of a licence system.
Sports Minister Nigel Huddleston insisted on Monday that the Government was pressing ahead with plans to create an Independent Regulator of English Football but that time would be taken to ensure it has an appropriate and efficient remit.
Under the proposals, which will be finalised and presented in a white paper this summer before being enshrined in law, clubs will have to hold a licence to operate legally that would involve a series of conditions.
To satisfy the licence, clubs would have to compete in competitions approved by Fifa, Uefa, the FA and agreed by supporters, meaning that if England’s most lucrative clubs attempted to sign up to a breakaway league again their licence could be removed and they would not legally be able to operate in England.
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Last year, Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United and Tottenham signed legally-binding contracts to join a breakaway league before it collapsed following intense backlash, particularly from supporters of those clubs. Executives at Real Madrid, Barcelona and Juventus are still, however, attempting to rekindle the competition.
The Government is examining how licensing models work in other industries, such as the Financial Conduct Authority, to create an appropriate model for football.
Huddleston said he was “fairly confident” English clubs would be blocked from future Super League plans “because it would go back to the licence condition of a club”. “We’d be giving a licence to operate and one of the elements under consideration there would be that it’s a competition based on merit, with some kind of prize or reward at the end. And the Super League wouldn’t really fit that criteria,” he said. “The licence would be a mechanism by which we could stop the Super League happening in the future.”
Huddleston urged patience from football fans and critics of current progress. Tracey Crouch MP, who conducted the fan-led review and made a raft of recommendations on which the government is basing its work, said it was a “worry” that a timeframe was unspecified. She had hoped the independent regulator could be legislated for in the Queen’s Speech, set to take place next week.
“If the major thing that people are complaining about is the timescale for getting on with it I’ll take that because it means the broad substance of the recommendations is being accepted,” Huddleston said. “We are going to be legislating and as part of the process for introducing legislation a white paper is fairly standard.
“We want to move forward quickly because we know there’s overwhelming demand for this and we know the problems in football. The thing is, if people are saying implement it tomorrow, that in itself could cause problems because we are laying out a fairly rigorous new regime for financial regulation that quite frankly some clubs might not be in a good place to deal with at this moment in time.
“If we implemented it tomorrow we could have exactly the opposite impact of what we are intending, i.e. making sure that clubs can survive and that they are financially sustainable. Because this licensing will come with some obligations and requirements and we need to make sure the clubs know what that is before we get it in legislation.”
Currently, the government will allow football’s governing bodies to agree upon a fairer distribution of finances throughout the pyramid, but Huddleston warned that if the Premier League and English Football League could not come an agreement powers would be handed to the independent regulator to sort it out. Meetings were held with Premier League chief executive Richard Masters and EFL chairman Rick Parry last week.
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“We hope they will come to some agreement about financial flows and we will continue to put the pressure on them to do so,” Huddleston said. “But if not we reserve the right for this to be part of the responsibilities of the Independent Regulator. That is the backstop point Tracey and others have called for.”
It was pointed out to Huddleston that should a general election take place before legislation is in place a new government would not have to follow through on a previous government’s manifesto pledges, but the Sports Minister said the independent regulator had cross-party support.
A Premier League spokesperson said: “We are reassured that the Government acknowledges the success of the Premier League and the importance of delivering change that also protects the League’s position as one of this country’s most successful global exports. It is this that creates the extraordinary football we see every week in grounds around the country and has enabled our ongoing commitment to support football at all levels by reinvesting an unprecedented £1.6 billion outside of the Premier League over the next three seasons.”
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