Kemi Badenoch has described football’s incoming regulator “a waste of money” as the Conservatives abandoned support for “bonkers” curbs on the English game.
Labour’s Football Governance Bill, currently making its way through the House of Lords, follows watchdog plans first put in place by the previous Tory Government.
However, Mrs Badenoch, who had opposed the regulator before becoming party leader, suggested it is now at risk of being an example of “so much rubbish that happens in government”.
“I think a football regulator is going to be a waste of money,” she said in an interview on The Telegraph’s Daily T podcast. “When I speak to people in the industry, they don’t think it’s going to work. So why are we doing it?”
Mrs Badenoch said she was “opposed to it personally” and “the party is looking at how we can improve the Bill because we don’t have the numbers in the Commons or even in the Lords to stop it”.
The Bill, initially introduced in March 2024, failed to pass through parliament before the general election was called last May. The Labour government then reintroduced it during July’s King’s Speech, announcing powers for an independent body overseeing clubs in England’s top five tiers. The government says it will “protect football clubs” by “ensuring their financial sustainability”, but the Premier League has led opposition, expressing concern over the impact on financial competitiveness and investment.
Mrs Badenoch told the Daily T: “People feel that a football regulator will help smaller clubs in towns and so on. That’s why they’re doing it. So I understand the problem that they’re trying to solve. I just don’t think a football regulator will do it. And I’ve always said so.”
Recruitment for the regulator’s first chair is well under way, with ministers working through a shortlist of candidates for the part-time post which has a salary of £130,000.
The Conservative leader said she was in favour of a “better state that delivers better services”. “The Conservative Party is under new leadership and all of the things which I thought were bonkers ideas we are not supporting,” she added.
A government-launched fan-led review of football and subsequent Football Governance Bill were borne out of international outrage over England’s so-called “big six” plotting to join a European Super League in 2021. That concept came after the financial collapse of Bury FC and protests erupting over a previous domestic breakaway idea, Project Big Picture.
Labour, the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats all formally committed to the regulator in their manifestos. But the issue has become increasingly divisive in recent months. Reform UK MP Rupert Lowe, a former chairman of Southampton FC, told the Commons last month: “Looking at the Financial Services and Markets Act and the damage that’s done to the London Stock Exchange and other markets, will the Government take responsibility if football declines after they introduce football regulation?”
