The Prime Minister has praised the role of football clubs in bringing together local communities as he pledged to help protect teams at all levels of the game during a visit to Eastleigh FC.
During a visit to the Silverlake Stadium in Eastleigh, Hampshire, Rishi Sunak had a chance to meet the first team players of the National League club as well as the coaches and managers.
The Prime Minister, who grew up in nearby Southampton, learned about the club’s training programme which includes young players aged between 16 and 19 studying for a Btec in Sport.
He congratulated the players on their successful FA Cup run and told them: “Even my mum picked up on it and was excited.”
Mr Sunak said: “When it comes to football, the thing that is important to me is making sure that we have sport that we all love, that’s supported and protected into the future.
“And clubs like this are a great example of the benefits that football bring to the local community like the cup run that has done an enormous amount to just boost a local community and bring everyone together.
“And that is why we we want to bring forward plans for a football regulator to make sure that the sport that we all love and is so intrinsic to the fabric of our country is protected into the future; that clubs are sustainable; that fans, importantly, have their voices heard and big decisions and, crucially, funding works across the football pyramid.
“We need to make sure that the funding reaches all the clubs and that’s why we’re bringing forward those plans to protect the sport.”
The Prime Minister also addressed concerns about funding for local authorities and said: “The funding that councils have received from Government has gone up in real terms after inflation every year and, if you look, on average this year, the total amount of money that councils have to spend on services has gone up by around 10%.”
He added that the Government was also providing funding through levelling up funds, high streets funds and towns funds.
Mr Sunak also said that a “balance” had to be reached on building new homes and business parks with the need to preserve green spaces.
He said: “We’ve got to get the balance right. We promised that we would build a million homes over this parliament.
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“I’m pleased we are on track to deliver that because young people do need to have the opportunity to own their own home, that’s the type of country we want to live in and we’re determined to deliver that.
“But it’s important that those homes are built in the right places and that’s why we’ve said we are in favour of protecting the green belt and not imposing top-down planning targets on local communities.”
