October 20 – The British government’s sports minister has stepped into the debacle over racial comments made to two England women internationals by urging the English FA to improve its handling of discrimination claims.
Earlier this week English football bosses apologised unreservedly to Eniola Aluko and Drew Spence for racial comments made to them by former manager Mark Sampson after a re-opened investigation – which originally found no evidence of discrimination – concluded that Sampson, subsequently sacked for “inappropriate and unacceptable” behaviour with female players in a previous job, did indeed make discriminatory remarks.
The organisation was subsequently described as “shambolic” as FA chiefs faced awkward questions during a four-hour parliamentary hearing which heard some explosive testimony from Aluko herself. (http://www.insideworldfootball.com/2017/10/19/english-fa-bosses-humiliated-sampson-case-exposes-racism-blackmail/)
“I hope the FA learns lessons from this whole sorry saga,” said sports minister Tracey Crouch who called on the organisation to ensure “that all in the sport and the wider public have faith in their processes and procedures.”
“We have been clear that we expect world-leading standards of governance from all our national sports governing bodies,” said Crouch.
Meanwhile, The FA has been accused by England’s Professional Footballers’ Association of ignoring the issues raised by the case which was brought in 2106 by Aluko, who is of African descent and won 102 caps for her country before being dropped.
“They didn’t listen to her then. They’re still not listening,” PFA chief executive Gordon Taylor told the BBC.
In his evidence to the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee, the normally mild-mannered FA chairman Greg Clarke (pictured) went way off piste when he turned on the PFA’s own conduct.
“The PFA spends millions of pounds a year on the CEO’s salary and pension and they are walking away from alcoholics, from addicted gamblers,” Clarke charged, much to the astonishment of parliamentarians and attending media. “I will never look up to their governance, though I respect their people.”
Taylor responded by saying Clarke’s outburst was an attempt to deflect criticism and “was so unprofessional it was amazing”.
He said Clarke had “burned bridges” between the two organisations and added: “We don’t need any lectures from the FA on good governance.”
“Aluko showed real courage, she presented really well, her honesty shone out compared to the FA, whose attitude and demeanour was quite different,” Taylor said.
“[The FA] looked to almost show more a duty of care and protection to themselves than to a girl who represented her country more than 100 times.
“We were the one organisation, the trade union, that believed in her. We were right to believe in her. We then ended up being the butt of the chairman of the FA, who turned on the trade union in what was classic diversionary tactics. It was very unprofessional and akin to a defendant in court having a go at the claimant’s legal team.
In an unprompted jibe during the parliamentary hearing, Clarke also claimed the PFA had stopped paying for two survivors of English football’s notorious child sex abuse scandal.
Taylor fumed back: “It’s false and untrue – to say we turned an abused player away is wrong. We’ve never turned anybody away, whether with problems of abuse, gambling or addiction. It might have been said in Parliament but it’s blatantly untrue.”
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