TER0035

Written evidence submitted by The Scottish Football Association Limited (“Scottish FA”), The Scottish Professional Football League Limited (“SPFL”) and The Scottish Women’s Premier League Limited (“SWPL”) 

TER0035

Summary response

The proposed Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill will impact our three organisations as the governing body of Scottish football (Scottish FA) and competition organisers (SPFL and SWPL) responsible for administering the leading football competitions in Scotland. Furthermore, both the Scottish FA itself and the respective members and participants of all three organisations are stadium owners.

We agree that the prevention of terror and the safety of the public at events are of huge importance, and we therefore welcome and support the proposed Bill and what it is aiming to achieve. However, we do wish to seek clarity on the following aspects of the Bill and the implications that they will have on each of our organisations; the appointment of the Designated Senior Officer, training, and funding available for required upgrades to qualifying premises.

Designated Senior Officer (DSO)

As stadium owners, both the Scottish FA and several clubs in Scottish football will fall under the Enhanced Tier and will therefore be required to appoint a DSO. We would be grateful for clarity on the following issues:

1. Will the DSO have to be a stand-alone role, or could it be added to the job specification of a current employee, for example a Stadium Operations Manager or a Safety Manager?
2. Can the role of DSO be outsourced to a third party, for example a stadium’s security provider?
3. Will there be any funded training made available to DSOs?

Training

Our organisations as well as member clubs will be required to provide training to “relevant workers” and would therefore seek clarity on the following issues:

1. The definition of “relevant workers” as drafted is quite vague. Would this just mean those employees directly involved in the organising and running of qualifying events, or all staff that work for the owner of a qualifying premises?
2. Will the venue owner/event organiser be responsible for the training of all relevant workers from third parties contracted to assist at events? E.g. security and hospitality providers?
3. Will there be training provided by the government and/or will there be funding made available to assist with training costs?

Required Upgrades

One requirement placed on the operators of qualifying premises will be to complete annual terrorism risk assessments. If operators identify required upgrades to their premises in order to make them safer, will there be public funding available to implement these changes?

Licensing and Enforcement

We note that the enforcement of the regime is dealt with by way of proposed amendments to the Licensing Act 2003. This is of concern because that Act extends only to England & Wales. Scotland has a distinct and separate licensing system. The Licensing (Scotland) Act 2005 deals with premises licences for the sale of alcohol. This can be contrasted with the position under the 2003 Act which also issues premises licences for other licensable activities including entertainment and late night refreshement and so on. Scots licensing law is also very clear that the 2005 Act can only be used to regulate the sale of alcohol, and cannot be used to regulate other activities which may occur on a licensed premises, so we are concerned about how the Bill will deal with this going forward. Scotland also has a separate licensing system for public entertainment, under the Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982.

June 2023