This has been a difficult year for referees, with Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta recently hitting out over a lack of consistency in officiating. It is an issue that has been a case throughout the season, with Bournemouth striker Evanilson recently wrongly sent off against Man United by Peter Bankes. That issue was then emphasised further when Bankes failed to send off Wolves full-back Rayan Ait-Nouri against Man City for what many saw to be a more dangerous challenge. But in spite of those problems, it appears Premier League sides may soon be facing even greater financial demands from the referees body which is currently run by Howard Webb.
According to a recent report from The Telegraph, it is expected that Webb will announce that PGMOL made a financial loss of £900,000 last year. That may have been influenced by the introduction of new technology into the Premier League, such as VAR and semi-automated offside. As a result, it is suggested that top-flight clubs in England will have to increase their budgets if they want to maintain a high standard of officiating. Hackett though, does not believe that clubs ought to be agreeing to such demands in the circumstances. After being asked by Football Insider what he made of those updates on the situation at the PGMOL, the former referee said: “I’ve got a lot to say on this! You talk to professional players, and I had the opportunity of talking to people like Tom Finney and Nat Lofthouse many years ago. They talked about their maximum wage of £7 a week, and part of that discussion was asking me how much did I get for a cup final as a referee. The answer was in 1981 I got £35. So ’81, it’s a long time ago. In that period – to give a bit of background – when I went into Europe to referee big games in Europe, Real Madrid, Barcelona, whatever. You didn’t get a match fee, you did it almost for the love which is remarkable isn’t it. You got a day allowance of a small amount of money to pay for food, travel – travel was paid for by them, hotel was paid for by them. There was one occasion where I had to referee a match – Stuttgart vs Feyenoord – and I had to be back for a board meeting and the outcome is to do that I had to spend two grand chartering an aircraft to bring me back home for that board meeting. This is not like a bad luck story, this is about commitment that referees used to give to the game. I lost a couple of jobs because of refereeing. The outcome of that is when I retired from refereeing, I started lobbying the chairman of the Premier League on the basis that we needed to go to professional referees. I helped write the paper, I didn’t submit but I read it, contributed to it. That was submitted and as a result the PGMOL was formed. The first manager was Philip Don, I was the development manager. Then I took over from him a couple of years later, and then in round about 2007 I retired to become referee ambassador for the Premier League. The reason I’m doing this is to talk about what we achieved because at that time, there was Graham Poll, Mark Halsey, Mark Clattenburg, Howard Webb, Graham Barber. So, we had a minimum of ten strong-personality referees delivering good performances. The turnover in 2007 when I left was £5.6million. And we had a £95,000 profit. The cost of sales was £5.5million. Then Mike Riley took over in 2008, and it went to £6million. So now we go eight years later, we’re looking at a turnover in 2019 of £20.3million. In 2020, it goes to £22million, in 2023 that figure goes to £33million with a loss after tax of £1.8million, and the latest results that have been posted – these are available in companies house, in detail. If we look at the current report of 2024 that was issued on companies house on 3 May, the turnover was £39million. So, in a period of 17 years it’s gone from £5million to almost £40million, and of course if recording a £900,000 loss. So he’s not actually saying they’re going to make a loss, they have made a loss. I think it’s deplorable, it’s unacceptable. I think that there needs to be a very clear root and branch review of the PGMOL organisation. If I were the clubs I wouldn’t give them one penny more, I’d be asking for something back. Now, the argument that’s often put forward is clubs are really wealthy, they’ve got bags of money, and it might be that you’ve got two or three players in a club that are earning this amount of money. That’s not the point, it’s not the point! The point is we went to professional referees to deliver better performances. What I’ve seen with the PGMOL is a lack of control in its expenditure, a lack of performance delivery at the coal-face and whilst they will continue to say that refereeing standards are improving, I would say that based on 50 years involvement in refereeing, with no chip on my shoulder, that that’s not the case. It’s just not the case! In my period of time in office – and I’m going back – I can tell you on average we had one major error every weekend. So, in ten games we had one major error. We had a staff of less than, I think ten people really, and now you’re getting to figures which are just over the top, too many administrators. I don’t worry about what referees earn, I want them to earn the maximum amount. But within this structure it’s like fat cats and no control of finance. What amazes is it’s got a board of directors and I cannot [believe] how a board of directors are allowing PGMOL to run into a loss situation. Now I know what we’ve done is, in that period of time, we’ve got Goal Line Technology, we’ve got VAR, I understand all that we’ve not got a semi automated [offside] system that’s coming in. But those are assets that can be amortised in a business and costed over a period of time. When I saw the figures I was gobsmacked. It’s gone up £6million in one year. £6million and he’s asking for more. So, I think it asks all sorts of questions: Who’s paying? Who’s getting the money? Where is it being spent? what are the returns on that investment?”
Source: Football Insider
