Labour MPs £8.5K BRIT Awards night out is ‘normal’ claims Premier League

Spending £8,500 to take five Labour MPs to the Brit Awards “is normal practice” the Premier League has claimed.

Following revelations that Sir Kier Starmer accepted £35,000 worth of tickets from football clubs and many other members of his party were gifted freebies worth thousands of pounds to sought after events like Taylor Swift concerts there has been greater scrutiny on the hospitality declared by MPs.

Analysis of The Register of Members’ Interests has revealed that as political debate raged over whether the wealthy organisation that oversees top flight soccer in England required an independent regulator, members of parliament were gifted tickets for British music’s most prestigious awards event.

After a champagne reception and three-course dinner, MPs watched performances by Calvin Harris, Ellie Goulding, Dua Lipa and Kylie Minogue at the star-studded bash hosted by Maya Jama and Roman Kemp.

However, when asked by the Express to explain why it would treat politicians to this luxurious experience as they debated taking away significant power from the Premier League the governing body merely insisted it was ‘normal’.

“The Premier League engages with a broad range of individuals including MPs. Like all industries, including many sports organisations, this is normal practice,” it claimed in a statement.

According to one of those guests who attended the glitzy event held at the O2 in London in March, Dr Rupa Huq, “wining and dining” by football’s most powerful body was repeated late into the night before a debate on the topic in Westminster a month later.

Six weeks before attending the Brits Dr Huq was one of eight MPs who grilled Premier League chief executive Richard Masters at a Select Committee hearing into football governance.

During that hearing, the Labour representative for Ealing described Premier League Profit and Sustainability Rules as “fishy”, as well as calling for greater fan power and opportunities to grow women’s football.

Following the session, the Premier League paid £1,250 for her to attend the Brit Awards and also footed the bill for her Labour colleagues Liz Kendall, Peter Kyle, Pat McFadden and Jake Richards to attend. Huq, Kyle and Richards came alone, while McFadden and Kendall had a plus one.

When the Football Governance Bill was debated in April, Dr Huq welcomed the proposal to regulate the sport more strictly but suggested there had been oversights such as not handing the new body powers to redistribute wealth more effectively.

She also discussed the hospitality she and her colleagues had received from the Premier League telling the House of Commons: “It would be easy to knock the Premier League for its hospitality towards MPs — it was in here late last night, wining and dining people — and its attempts to push the free market, but in recent years our clubs have done us proud in Europe, in all-England finals in 2019 and 2021, and in 2023.”

When we asked the Premier League to provide clarity on what “wining and dining” it was doing the night before this debate the footballing body referred to a press release that said CEO Masters and National League General Manager Mark Ives had expressed concerns about the Football Governance Bill to both Houses ahead of the debate.

It has been reported elsewhere that similar points were made at a drinks reception in Westminster.

The current register of financial interests for MPs currently features no entries for the night referenced by Huq (April 22, 2024) concerning hospitality by the Premier League. Although it’s not uncommon for interested parties to host events in Parliament and for them to be undeclared. The rules only require MPs to disclose hospitality worth £300 or more, so the event could be below the threshold.

We also asked the Premier League if it could provide any further context or justification for taking five MPs to the Brits, invitations worth £8,500, and whether the invitation of Dr Rupa Huq represented a conflict of interest given her position on the Culture Media and Sport Select Committee examining football governance.

The sporting body did not respond to these points individually or us asking it to respond to the suggestion this was an effort to influence a powerful voice in the debate over football governance.

It did, however, provide the general statement quoted earlier in this article.

When asked about her attendance at the Brits Liz Kendall said “this was declared in the usual way”.

Dr Rupa Huq, Peter Kyle, Pat McFadden and Jake Richards did not respond to our requests for comment.