And the Sun Shines Now: How Hillsborough and the Premier League Changed Britain
The subtitle says it all really. A well researched and constructed book that starts by describing the horror that was Hillsborough and the way that the police, football authorities, media and politicians colluded to blame Liverpool fans for the disaster instead of the lack of investment in safety at grounds and poor policing handing to the media and politicians a stick to beat football fans and to hand football over to big business thereby alienating fans. Most of us are still coming to terms with this and whilst you can never change your team more fans are staying away from matches or following other smaller teams in leagues which aren't completely at the mercy of dodgy billionaire owners buying trophies. Even little Leicester are owned by a Thai billionaire. Hardly Roy of the Rovers stuff. Context is given in that the Conservative government funding by big business was at war with workers and the unions and also other radical groups such as CND and the travellers community (both traditional and new age hippy punks). War on football fans was just another front for the authorities. And whilst Thatcher is name checked let's not kid ourselves that it was just her. The Tory party head is put there by faceless, or at least shy, lobbyists and business interests. And it wasn't just the Tories who attacked workers, fans and radicals Labour are hardly blameless in keeping their paymasters sweet at the expense of those not directly keeping them in their power bases.
The book charts the commercialisation of football, first stop Sky and seating, as a proxy for the commercialisation and privatisation of much of what was publically owned. Yes, football clubs were always privately owned but usually by local businessmen with a vested interest, often as genuine fans, in the club. Now they are assets to be played with in the same way that our energy, telecoms and infrastructure is. China running our nuclear power stations? They don't need to drop bombs on us they just press the "melt down" button. "Free market" philosophy gone mad. Just an excuse for the rich to get richer by doing dodgy deals with state owned players from abroad.
Tempany then compares our football with Germany where most clubs are still fan owned. And they have terracing. And drink beer. And don't have Hillsborough style disasters. He compares to Germany's treatment of small firms in general and both the author and the Germans he speaks to can't understand how English fans allowed our game to be so fucked up. The answer is in the book - money making trumps all.
The book concludes with the Hillsborough verdict being positive despite the police still trying to blame fans. But to be cynical who cares. I can understand that it's comforting to survivors (Adrian is one) and families of the bereaved and therefore well worth fighting for but as always in these miscarriages of justice those responsible are long gone from the scene having taken big fat pensions with them and very unlikely to be brought to justice themselves. It's like the phone hacking scandal. Guarantee the authorities will open it up again to prove that they are serious about justice once everyone involved is retired, dead or "too ill to give evidence". Whilst the book finishes fairly positively, at least about British justice being served, it ought not to. A compelling read though.
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