WHAT THEY SAID
THE STATEMENTS
Scottish FA
(Ian Maxwell, chief executive)
“The Scottish FA condemns in the strongest possible terms the spate of incidents this season involving unacceptable conduct in Scottish football. This season we have witnessed match officials and players hit by coins, sectarian singing at matches and abusive and threatening behaviour towards match officials, players, managers and coaching staff. This behaviour is completely unacceptable and simply has no place in football, or indeed Scottish society. “Football has a responsibility to take action. We must do all that we can under our current rules and engage with clubs to seek to eradicate such behaviour. “This issue, however, is not one that football can solve on its own. To that end, SPFL chief executive Neil Doncaster and I recently met with Cabinet Secretary for Justice Humza Yousaf, Minister for Public Health, Sport and Wellbeing Joe Fitzpatrick and Police Scotland Assistant Chief Constable Bernie Higgins to discuss unacceptable conduct in football and how we can work together to address this. We will seek further discussions in light of the most recent events to maintain the momentum for change.” Rangers Football Club “Rangers wishes to make it clear unacceptable behaviour will not be tolerated at Ibrox. Everything will be done to eradicate this kind of behaviour.” Kilmarnock Football Club “The board’s position is that they and everyone at the club is fully behind Steve in condemning sectarianism in all its forms. There is no place for sectarianism in football or society.” Nil By Mouth (David Scott, charity campaign director) “Scottish football has failed for generations to tackle sectarianism. Clubs, particularly the Old Firm clubs, invest hundreds of thousands of pounds in very sophisticated software and CCTV footage where you can identify people.
“So what you have here is a reluctance to actually pursue this because you could be talking about hundreds of people, whole stands, singing and chanting.
“Police can’t wade in and make arrests, which is why we are brought back again and again to the elephant in football’s room of strict liability, which is a European model for tackling this type of behaviour that holds the clubs responsible for consistent failures to tackle this issue.
“What we have seen in Scottish football, particularly it has to be said from the Old Firm clubs, is a complete washing of hands and saying ‘this is nothing to do with us, this is society’s problem and we can’t solve it’. Even though we are creating an environment where people feel they can go to matches and behave in this manner.
“You would not behave in this manner in your workplace, although some sadly do, I know that from my own work. You wouldn’t behave in that manner in communities without sanction.
“So why do we allow this permissive environment in football to go on? It’s simply because the clubs and football authorities do not have the bottle, the backbone, the spine to do something about it.”