Brown worry on football coverage (BBC News today)
It’s far, far, far too late for Prime Minister Gordon Brown to show his concern of football fans being denied their right to watch the game on the box. Where on earth has he been these past eleven years? Most fans knew such a situation would happen when Sky paid an excessive amount of money for the right to show Premier League matches. Just over one and a half million people were able to watch the England-Croatia World Cup qualifier live last night on Setanta Sports, falling to just 290,000 for highlights (Setanta has rights to screen all of England’s away World Cup matches live)
The government had enough chances to bring in leglislation to stop such sports events being driven to pay-TV companies, but saw it as an afterthought… not a major issue…
But it is an issue- a very important issue. More should be done to secure sports rights for all fans, not just for those who can afford to pay.