Minister hits out at football clubs furloughing their staff

BILLIONAIRE football club owners who are furloughing backroom staff, while keeping star players on full pay should be “thinking very carefully about their next steps”, Oliver Dowden has warned.

The Secretary for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport has issued an ultimatum to clubs who are leaving “the public purse to pick up the cost” of low-paid workers, while “players earn millions and billionaire owners go untouched”.

“I know the public will rightly take a very dim view of this,” he said.

On Saturday, Liverpool became the fifth Premier League club to use the Government’s job retention scheme, joining Newcastle, Tottenham, Bournemouth and Norwich.

Liverpool said it would use the measure for around 200 employees, despite announcing pre-tax profits of £42 million and increased turnover of £533 million in the 2018-19 financial year.

The move attracted criticism from former Anfield stars Jamie Carragher and Stan Collymore, but was defended by Gary Lineker yesterday. The Match of the Day presenter described footballers as “easy game” and asked why bankers had not been scrutinised.

He asked: “Why not call on all the wealthy to try and help if they can, rather than just pick on footballers?

“They’ve always been easy game. Nobody seems to talk about the bankers, the CEOS, huge millionaires. Are they standing up? We don’t know.

“Football clubs, they’re going to lose fortunes because football can’t exist when there’s no football taking place and clubs will be in desperate trouble.”

The decision of many clubs to use taxpayer money to pay ground staff, while keeping players on their multimillion pound salaries has caused concern in upper reaches of Government.

The Chancellor said it was “incumbent upon all businesses whether they’re football clubs or others, quite frankly, to act responsibly”.

Rishi Sunak said he hoped the Premier League would “take that message on board”, while Health Secretary Matt Hancock said: “Given the sacrifices many people are making, including some of my colleagues in the NHS, I think the first thing Premier League footballers can do is play their part.”