Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-03-28-Speech-3-242"
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"en.20070328.19.3-242"2
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".
Ladies and gentlemen, football is far and away the most popular sport in Europe, and the environment and atmosphere surrounding football have a major influence on young people. This influence is all the stronger as it is spontaneous and not imposed from above.
It is therefore important that football is not viewed solely as a environment awash with large amounts of money, an environment conducive to lawbreaking and acts of violence and an environment whose top levels are completely cut off from the amateur leagues that form the foundation of the game. At the same time, the amateur leagues are, I would venture to say, more socially beneficial than the exclusive environment of professional sport, in which business has to a large extent detracted from the original pleasures of the game.
Along with rapporteur Mr Belet, I wish to call on the EU to ensure that the customs and habits of professional sport do not influence student and youth football, and that children are not traded on the basis of their talent and performance, as though they were young gladiators. This practice affects the right of children to develop their personalities in an open atmosphere with a broad range of knowledge, and introduces the unforgiving adult world into their upbringing. At the same time, football clubs become less interested in devoting the time and effort to developing their own young players. This in turn has the effect of restricting the large-scale involvement of children in popular sports, and of strengthening selection, which turns a small minority of talent into merchandise while the majority are left on the margins.
Top-level football influences not only its own players and spectators; it also constitutes a world in which children and young people in particular find their role models. We should therefore try to ensure that football stadiums stop being venues for aggressive behaviour, that xenophobia and racism disappear from football and that the business surrounding football is not – rightly or wrongly – linked to corruption."@en1
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