New Beginnings
Gordon Taylor OBE, PFA Chief Executive
As I reflect on the last 30 years of achievement at the PFA and what the Football in the Community scheme has meant to so many people from diverse backgrounds, with different ideals, different motivations and from different cultures, a remarkable fact comes to mind.
At the Euro 2016 championships, each of the final 16 teams in the competition contained a member of our PFA – an extraordinary testament to how far our game has come and demonstrates that irrespective of culture, race, creed, religion or politics, we are an open and welcoming country.
Casting my mind back three decades to the mid-1980s when we at the PFA sat down and started to talk about where football in England was – and what a battering it was taking – the scene was unremittingly bleak.
CHALLENGES AHEAD
I had taken over from Cliff Lloyd as the PFA chief executive in 1981, eager to build on so much of the excellent work of the association in so many ways. The working conditions for players had gradually improved, the maximum wage had been abolished and at the advent of TV coverage in the 1950s, Cliff had negotiated with the television companies to protect payments to the union on behalf of the players. We were in a good place but we knew there were several daunting challenges ahead.
Then, the going got really tough. Football was being used for political reason – extreme groups latched on to it, we experienced pitch invasions, racism, the horrors at a number of stadiums, notably Heysel and Valley Parade at Bradford before the Hillsborough disaster concluded an appalling decade.
Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher pinned the blame on football, and there was talk of identity cards just to get into stadiums; Sir Bert Millichip and Ted Croker, the chairman and secretary of the Football Association, insisted it was a societal problem and it seemed impossible to resolve the differences between politicians and the football authorities.
We at the PFA felt we had to take the initiative. We said there was no use playing a blame game and that if football was our major spectator and participant sport, then it was clearly a vital part of our social fabric and we needed to use it for the greater good. Some threw up their hands and said ‘there’s nothing you can do about it, it’s just the way society is’.
COMMUNITY EFFORTS
If we had done nothing, there was every chance the game could have died on its feet. We got all the staff together – Micky Burns, our Education Officer to the fore – and discussed how we could make football a force for good. We decided that by asking our members to agree to a clause in their contracts to work a few hours a week on community work, they would be showing an enormous degree of social responsibility.
They would go into the schools and the rundown areas around our grounds, where so many homes were boarded up, and preach a gospel of better behaviour, how important it was that people were involved with their local football club, to extol equality schemes and diversity, discuss crime in inner cities, talk about the benefits of sport for health reasons, promote the virtues of education if kids were playing truant, and teach them about their local club and the history of the game.
People looked at us – frowned may be a better description – and wondered if we could ever change it.
We said we’d try a pilot scheme in the North West, at six clubs: Manchester United, Manchester City, Oldham Athletic, Preston North End, Bury and my old club, Bolton, providing jobs for ex-players. What was looked at very dubiously in its initial period then extended and extended and is now not only established in this country but sets a great example to the rest of the world extolling football’s contribution to social responsibility.
“The change has been phenomenal. But we need to remember where football was to truly appreciate where it is now”
There has been a massive change in the intervening years to the extent that it is one of the major reasons why football, instead of dying on its feet, regained its popularity – attracting people who had never been before, more women, youngsters, family stands, all-seater stadia, it was the game to be at.
I like to think from that particular acorn a lot of oak trees have grown and football set that process in motion and set the standard. We have conferences here at the PFA where countries from around the world come to find out what we do and what effect it has.
MAKING A DIFFERENCE
Several images spring to mind. I particularly remember talking to local police officers, who said what a difference it was making to their job to see the football club embracing the community and having players going out and speaking against knife crime and hooliganism. The letters we had by the dozen from schools saying how good it was players could come out to their schools and get the message across.
There was the time I visited a centre in Liverpool where disabled youngsters were playing football at a community function. One of the parents approached me and said I had no idea what a difference had been made to the quality of life of her son and herself. Her son so loved the interaction with players and it gave her such peace of mind that she was able to bring him to these sessions and talk to other parents of disabled children and share their stories.
We also funded a programme for young offenders to take coaching courses in Wigan. I’ll always remember the response of one of the lads in there when he started to coach. I told him who I was, that we helped with the funding and said we just wanted the lads in here to do well, and for them to be able to engage in something meaningful when they were released. He said: ‘Mr Taylor, all my life I’ve been told what to do, what to do, what to do. For the first time, I’m running a course and the youngsters are asking me what to do.’ It was a humbling moment.
So, here we are, 30 years down the road. Football in this country is thriving. It is a £7 billion dollar industry worldwide thanks to the remarkable success of the Premier League, the bolstering of the English Football League and the fact we have a Conference in which over half the players are full-time. People who once ran scared of football now need to be there. The change has been phenomenal. But we do need to remember where it was to truly appreciate where it is now.
There have been a whole lot of issues we have addressed, we have been open and inviting, we have women on our management committee, the women’s game is flourishing, we’re getting to the stage where English Football League clubs will introduce an open and fair recruiting system for all academy coaching staff. These are massively important steps forward.
LASTING IMPACT
There are still many things in football that aren’t perfect but what we started in the 1980s has had a real and lasting impact – no doubt about it. We don’t sit back, there are always new challenges. And with any cause, the longer it runs the more you need to keep it fresh.
We are all one football family and if one tribe wants to be divisive and only think about itself that will be self-defeating. We know the issues out there – racism, homophobia, anti Semitism, Islamophobia and all the gender issues - they haven’t gone away, they’re always below the surface if you’re not careful but the message from football is more important than ever because our country has assimilated more nationalities than any other country in the world, which is to our credit.
But remember where we’ve come from, those dark days of the ’80s. I refer again to the statistic about all of the nations in the Euro 2016 final 16 containing at least one member of our PFA. Of that, we can be enormously proud and privileged.
Looking to the Future
John Hudson, PFA Director of Corporate Social Responsibility
Today, in this ever-changing football world, the PFA’s role is focussed on the PFA Capability Status of football club foundations and Community Player engagement.
These form part of the over-arching governance structure endorsed by both the Premier League Charitable Fund and the Football League Trust. The formalised player appearance procedures ensure that the PFA remains at the heart of all community work, providing inspirational role models that underpin activities across the national game.
As we celebrate the achievements of the PFA’s community support over the past three decades, we continue to embrace the changing needs of society in areas of health, education, social inclusion, sports participation and equalities.
We also see the positive difference community work has made through the partnership with football’s governing bodies and the influence of PFA members both past and present. Corporate Social Responsibility is no longer the best kept secret but we must ensure that the influence of our pioneers back in 1986 – who saw that something had to be done during a dark time for the game, and had the vision and determination to tackle the
problem – is sustained. Under the guidance of PFA Chief Executive Gordon Taylor OBE, who continues to play a leading role for positive community impact, the ground-breaking spirit first displayed all those years ago is as strong as it ever was. That is the PFA’s determination. Here’s to the next 30 years.
Celebrating 30 years of the PFA’s Community Programme brochure: click here.
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