English Football Association chairman Greg Clarke has
accused professional game representatives on the governing body’s board of
blocking a diversity review of its members.
The FA have been keen to promote former Chelsea and Aston
Villa defender Paul Elliott, who is chair of the organisation’s inclusion
advisory board, to their full board.
Elliott was the FA’s choice to represent the country’s
Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) community.
But the FA’s plans appeared to have been damaged after
Clarke revealed representatives from the Premier League and the English
Football League blocked the move.
Players in the Premier League and Football League have
been taking a knee before matches in support of the Black Lives Matter cause
since the coronavirus hiatus.
“We discussed a number of options including: making
the chair of the inclusion advisory board (Paul Elliott) a director and giving
the professional and national games an extra board seat each that could provide
the flexibility to allow appointment of diverse candidates should they be the
best qualified person for the role,” Clarke wrote in a letter to the FA
Council.
“Both our independent directors offered to stand down
to create opportunities for a more diverse board but the board was united in
declining their offer.
“The professional game were against such a review,
believing the changes introduced in 2017 were sufficient. The national game
were sympathetic to a review and consultation with Council but did not want to
oppose the professional game.
“However, without the support of the professional
game and national game, who have a majority of directors, a review of the FA
board composition is not possible.”
The professional game representatives on the board are
Peter McCormick, the chairman of the legal advisory group of the Premier
League, English Football League chairman Rick Parry and Rupinder Bains, who
jointly represents the Premier League and the EFL.
The 2017 reforms which Clarke says the professional game
representatives deemed sufficient have led to BAME representation on the board
reaching 10 per cent, 10 per cent representation from the LGBT community and 40
per cent representation for women.
“I had hoped that the FA, as the game’s governing
body, would have been able to examine whether its own board was appropriately
constituted to represent a diverse game and share its thinking with
Council,” Clarke added.
“This process is happening across football but will
not now happen with respect to the FA board.
“As FA chairman this disappoints me, as leader of
Council I felt honour bound to inform you of the situation. It seems to me
better to be open on the issue now rather than surprise Council when Paul
Elliott publishes the recommendations of his working group in October.”
