Where : Miners Institute, Neville Hall, opposite the Union Rooms in Newcastle.
Change the name of the team, change the colour of the shirts, make the team play 40 miles away from their home ground…..maybe change the name of the ground to advertise your other business interests. If you own a football club it seems you can do this without the fans, who were there before you and who’ll be there after you, having any say. The views of the major stakeholders don’t seem to matter in football.
At Newcastle United, Mike Ashley can behave the way he does because of the way football operates with supporters having absolutely no power or authority at all to act as checks and balances on decisions he makes about our club. It’s the same at Hull, Cardiff, Coventry, Blackburn, Man Utd and others but Mike Ashley is a symptom of how football operates, not the cause.
Self regulation of football hasn’t worked just as it didn’t for the Banks and many other vital services left to narrow corporate interests.
Whilst Newcastle United is our particular interest, there is a wider agenda. Football generally has been described by senior politicians at Westminster as operating with the worst example of governance of any national sport.
A Government Select Committee report produced in 2010 asked the Premier League and football in general to bring forward proposals for change in the governance arrangements.
Due to the lack of progress, at the beginning of 2013 a further report was produced saying “We recommend that the Department for Culture Media and Sport make it clear to the football authorities that further progress on these issues is expected within twelve months. In the absence of significant progress, the Government should introduce legislation as soon as practically possible.”
An all party parliamentary group published a report in February 2014 recommending “Each of the parties should also prepare detailed plans for their election manifestos, aimed at addressing the inherent weaknesses in this dysfunctional system once and for all.”
But still there has been precious little progress.
Come along to our next public meeting this Saturday with the theme “Political Football”to let Ian Mearns, MP for Gateshead and Mary Glindon, MP for North Tyneside know how we want them to help us influence the national agenda. We will also have Kevin Rye from Supporters Direct and Kevin Miles, Chief Executive of the Football Supporters Federation to update us on what is happening nationally to improve supporter engagement and football governance generally.
The meeting will last about an hour and a half so there’s plenty of time for a pint before you head off to the game against Hull City.
NUST BOARD
Website: www.nust.org.uk
Facebook: www.facebook.com/nufctrust
Twitter: https://twitter.com/nufctrust
Email: enquiries@nust.org.uk
Youtube: www.youtube.com/nufctrust
Blog : www.nust.org.uk/blog
Website : www.justnewcastle.org.uk
Facebook : www.facebook.com/JUSTNewcastle
Twitter : https://twitter.com/just_newcastle
When deliberating the future of our great club please remember the Blackburn situation where protests over the management and owners resulted in relegation and the same owners.
Be supporters not critics or we are down. Our fans are revolting and that is shooting us in the foot again. Granted the manager is a twat and the owner worse but our team need the support of the main asset we have and that’s the fans.
Supporting the team and supporting the club have become two separate entities. The former is a short term objective that perpetuates the long term demise of NUFC under an owner who cares not one jot for our club. The question facing supporters this weekend is whether three points are more important than trying to rid ourselves of a manager who isn’t good enough for our club and 100% behind the owner’s abject objectives.
Personally (as a supporter of 30 plus years) I hope we get thrashed against Hull and Pardew gets 90 minutes of dogs abuse as I see this outcome as the first step in NUFC fighting back against a regime that is trying to remould the club as an ambition free advertising hoarding. The first step in restoring the club’s pride. The first step in reclaiming our club from a regime that doesn’t respect it. I don’t expect everybody to see it this way but the important thing is that supporters respect each others opinions. We all have the club’s interests at heart even if we can’t agree on the best way forward. My fear for Saturday is we will see another bout of supporter on supporter infighting.
Ultimately Pardew is symbolic of (and complicit in) everything that is wrong with NUFC under the current regime. It would be a victory for the club if we can hasten his exit.
Spot on. Hat doffed.
Would it be possible to give some bullet points after the meeting so those of us a bit further afield can e mail our own MPs and put a bit pressure on them.