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The UK’s new football regulator should be seen as an “asset” to the game and not a “cop”, the preferred chair of the body responsible for rooting out rogue owners and monitoring clubs’ finances has said.
David Kogan, a veteran media executive, told MPs on Wednesday that while the regulator had “quite a lot of teeth”, it was designed to be “light touch” with a “relatively lightweight bureaucracy”.
“I want the regulator to have a help desk and have a way whereby we’re not seen as being a cop in the world of football, we’re seen as being an asset to the world of football,” he told the House of Commons culture, media and sport committee.
The Labour party donor, who has written books about the party, also addressed concerns about his ties to the party and admitted he would have to deal with “perceived bias”.
Kogan disclosed he had donated “very small sums of money” to both prime minister Sir Keir Starmer and culture secretary Lisa Nandy in the party’s leadership battle five years ago. It was already known that he had donated thousands of pounds to the Labour party and Rachel Reeves when she was shadow chancellor.
He noted that the previous Conservative government had first approached him about chairing the regulator.
“I hope that what I’ve demonstrated is my own professional capabilities, my own interest in football, my own sense of where the regulator should be going, and the fact that there is now a need to get going with things,” he said.
The prime minister’s spokesman on Wednesday defended the appointment saying it was a competitive process and that all rules had been followed, with previous political activity no block to such appointments.
The Conservative party has raised questions, however, about whether there was a possible breach of the ministerial code after Kogan revealed the donations to Starmer and Nandy to MPs on Wednesday for the first time. Ministerial code requires ministers to ensure “that no conflict arises, or could reasonably be perceived to arise” from their public duties and private interests.
His remarks come against a backdrop of concerns, particularly at the Premier League, that the body could deter investment in one of Britain’s greatest cultural exports and undermine the division’s competitiveness.
The regulator, which is being established through a bill currently going through parliament, was recommended by former Conservative sports minister Tracey Crouch following a review of the game in England.
The creation of a football regulator followed the collapse of Bury in 2019 and the failed attempt two years later by six English top-flight clubs to create a breakaway European Super League.
Kogan, who has negotiated media rights deals on behalf of the major football competition organisers in England, said that if clubs lacked the accounting practices to answer questions about their financing and liquidity, the body would supply it.
“If you do not have an understanding of what we’re trying to do, we will send a team to you,” he added.
Kogan said that he looked forward to speaking with football chiefs about resolving the differences between the Premier League and the English Football League, which runs the Championship, League One and League Two, over how money is shared by the top flight with the rest of the football pyramid.
The regulator will have “backstop” powers that enable it to intervene in the negotiations, which have dragged on for years. But Kogan, a fan of Tottenham Hotspur, urged football bosses to “agree among themselves” and “not to invoke” the backstop.
“The less you hear of the regulator, the better,” he said.
