Government may impose levy on Premier League’s TV money – minister

http://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/sep/09/government-levy-premier-league-tv-money-minister

Version 0 of 1.

The government could impose a levy on the Premier League’s broadcasting fortunes for distribution to football’s grassroots if the league does not share more money voluntarily, the minister for culture, media and sport has said.

Related: TV cash takes more than England’s elite beyond reach of continentals | David Conn

John Whittingdale, setting out his department’s priorities to the House of Commons culture, media and sport committee, said the Premier League needs to make more of its “vast amount of money” available to help local clubs which are struggling. he league’s 20 clubs, whose combined UK and international TV rights deals for 2016-19 are expected to exceed £8bn, do not distribute more of that “bonanza”. Similar comments were made in June by the sports minister, Tracey Crouch, whose position is junior to Whittingdale’s in the department, when she said she was “genuinely appalled” by how little the Premier League distributes and that it should give “much more” to the grassroots.

Whittingdale told the committee: “The Premier League is enjoying a complete bonanza now. There is a huge amount of money coming in but the proportion of that that reaches the lower divisions and the grassroots in particular is still very small. Should they be doing more? Without any question.”

On the question of whether the government could intervene, he said: “If the Premier League absolutely refuses to increase the amount of money that passes down through the system to the benefit of grassroots sport, then I think we would certainly look at what options we have available to us to ensure that is the outcome. I hope that can be avoided. It would be perfectly possible for the Government to intervene to achieve that outcome, maybe through a levy.”

The Premier League is paid £5.5bn from broadcasters for its current, 2013-16 TV deals, from which it contributes only £12m a year to the Football Foundation, whose role is to improve grassroots football facilities nationwide. The Football Association matches that contribution, while Whittingdale’s department, via Sport England, invests only £10m. Whittingdale’s government and the previous Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition have also imposed billions of pounds in cuts to local authorities, which from 2010-14 resulted in a £400m reduction in spending on sport and leisure, including on grassroots football facilities, according to the Local Government Association.

The Premier League says its current total contribution to grassroots facilities, community projects and other “good causes” is £168m a year, amounting to 3% of its TV income. Payments to the Football League and Conference in “solidarity‚“ are £161m a year, also approximately 3%.

Related: Yohan Cabaye’s Crystal Palace move shows TV cash sets Premier League apart

In 1999 following the Labour government’s support for Premier League clubs to maintain the lucrative right to sell their broadcasting rights as a collective group of 20, the Premier League pledged to distribute 5% of its total income to grassroots facilities and projects, but it now considers that pledge to have lapsed.

The Premier League’s chief executive, Richard Scudamore, has already said it will distribute £1bn of its expected 2016-19 TV income outside of its 20 clubs, but a substantial portion of that, as Whittingdale and Crouch have pointed out, will be in parachute payments to professional clubs relegated from the Premier League.

“The real challenge is to get right down into the grassroots,” Whittingdale said. “Every MP will have local clubs who are struggling, and in some cases failing, to survive, and yet there is this vast amount of money at the top of the game.”

The league is yet to finalise what its distributions will be to each area of the game, but as the broadcasting income is due to increase so spectacularly, it is expected to contribute more money to the grassroots, even if the proportion distributed remains 3%.

Governments have threatened the Premier League and FA with legislation and other interventions several times over the years of financial boom for football, but none have translated those threats into action.