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More licensed bullying

Following on the pubs being leant on to fingerprint their customers and take names and addresses, another egregious example of police and licensing authorities clubbing together to force a business to stop its paying customers behaving in ways officialdom does not approve of.

West Ham are under pressure from Newham Council and the Football Licensing Authority to limit persistent standing inside Upton Park, and several supporters have been banned from attending the next two home games at Upton Park for persistent standing.

Those who have been sent letters informing them of the action, will miss West Ham’s Premiership games against Blackburn and Arsenal on the next two Sundays.

– from VitalFootball.co.uk

“Persistent standing”? I am no soccer fan as I abhor the tribalism of team sports, and it is really, really, dull to watch – almost as dull as horse- or motor-racing. I would not know about this at all but for Duleep Allilrajah’s column on Sp!ked. But is not leaping up and down, along with shouting and singing as part of a crowd, a significant part of football supporting? And unlike cheering and community singing, standing or sitting has no effect on the world outside the stadium. What has it got to do with anyone but the club and its supporters?

Perhaps if I had taken more notice of soccer before now, I would have known of the existence ot the Football Licensing Authority, too. It is a public body created under Thatcher, for those tempted to idealise Britain before Blair. But we should all take notice of it now, because its imperial ambition is charted out on its website, a clear mission to tell everyone involved in doing or watching sport what to do:

In December 1998, following a major review, the Government announced that we would in due course become the Sports Ground Safety Authority. It presented legislation to this effect to Parliament but the 2001 General Election intervened. Ministers are committed to reintroducing it when they can find a place in the Parliamentary timetable.

One small mystery. Why should the Borough of Newham connive at undermining one of the poor borough’s richest sources of trade and employment? Could it be that the bureaucrats who seek such petty restrictions will get paid and pensioned from taxes raised in other places regardless of how blasted into feebleness the people in their care remain? Or are they just getting into practice to discipline the Olympics?

7 comments to More licensed bullying

  • Julian Taylor

    I think you got it with the end sentence. Newnham doesn’t have any large-scale stadia bar Upton Park so it might make sense to them to start practicing their authoritarian ‘grooming’ on West Ham supporters.

  • Yes this is just pettifogging officialdom ‘strutting its stuff’.

    However I take a very different view than Guy regarding sport and the ‘tribal urge’ generally.

  • Manuel II Paleologos

    When I went to games in the 80s, the glorious sense of anarchy was the major attraction of the game. As a teenager, it gave me a sense of dizzying freedom to be able to stand in a crowd, swear at policemen and generally misbehave. I realise that this gave rise to all sorts of nastiness, but personally I only ever saw one minor fight through all that time, and it’s something I look back on with fondness. Some of the games were quite good too.

    These days you sit in a numbered seat with rows of “stewards” with their backs to the pitch watching your every move, organised by a chief steward who will co-ordinate these goons with a walkie talkie. They will make a point of always ejecting one or two people from the ground, usually for persistent standing up, or for swearing. Every now and then a minor groundswell of defiance will grip the crowd and they will insist on standing for a period to irk the stewards, but a few ejections usually sorts them out.

    It’s no fun at all and I don’t go any more. As you suggest, the game itself is not that exciting. I decided to stop going before it got to the point where I got thrown out for failing to applaud the opposing team.

  • Ted Schuerzinger

    Perhaps FIFA can have England suspended for the government’s interfering with the running of the game? 🙂

  • Persistent standing?

    What next…the Ministry of Silly Walks?

  • Johnathan Pearce

    I could not resist a quiet smile over the lengths Guy went to to stress how little he likes or is interested in, football.

    That said, Guy’s point is valid and I honestly don’t see how this silly sort of rule can be enforced without putting many people off attending games. You might as well try to nag people for chatting during the theatre, opera or a movie (the latter being a particular hatred of mine).

  • Paul Marks

    I agree with Guy. It is yet another case of the Health and Safety Mafia (“do this for your own good – or else”).

    If a club wants to have a stand where people stand up that is up to them (whatever the governments statutes say) – and if people wish to buy tickets and go and to this stand that is their affair.

    Sure they may get killed. But anyone may be killed crossing a road – or doing anythine else.

    “Take the gold and you will die” said the Dragon to the Man. “You mean if I do not take the gold I will never die?” said the Man to the Dragon.