A Sponsorship Game Changer - Taking Sport Beyond High-Carbon, Gambling, and Alcohol
The relationship between money and sport is complex…
This show has often discussed the issues that arise when the biggest carbon emitters buy or sponsor a sports club, often with the objective of improving their legitimacy or reputation. But this episode goes one step deeper, by looking at the more nuanced capital in-flows that have a few a degrees of separation.
For example, the organisations that invest in or fund others to extract fossil fuels, rather than doing it themselves. Additionally, there are businesses that continuously try to tempt the consumer into making key purchases that will cause significant harm either to the consumer or somewhere else along the supply chain. And because of that separation, it’s tricky for sports fans to know that the companies whose names adorn the fronts of their teams' jerseys are profiting from something they might not agree with.
But help is on the way. Michael Hardy has long sought to get his local team, Liverpool FC, to drop Standard Chartered as a sponsor. Standard chartered fund in a range of projects across the world that do not uphold the human rights of their workers and are responsible for a massive about of emissions. To try to make a difference, Michael and Platform, the organisation he works for, are launching the Game Changer Sponsorship Pledge: an exciting new initiative that tries to bring everyone who cares about sport but does not want to benefit from harm-causing activities. They want to put pressure on sports commercial directors to make better choices that better reflect the values of the fans, even if that means less lucrative deals.
You can learn more about the Game Changer Sponsorship Pledge at: badverts.org/gamechanger
Episode Transcript
Ben:
So let's just begin at the beginning, shall we? Where did your relationship with sport begin?
Michael: 2:50
I grew up in Anfield. As you can already probably tell, I'm from Liverpool and I'm a big Liverpool fan. I live in Anfield, in the shadow of the stadium. I live very, very close to the ground and it's a huge part of people's lives, like it is up and down the country and around the world. Football plays a fundamental part in growing up in the area that you live in and what it means to be a Liverpool fan, especially with the culture that you have around, being a specific supporter of Liverpool, a supporter of football and all that comes along with that. I've always tried to go to as many games as I can at Anfield and it's always been something that I've enjoyed to do and something that I've cared a lot about.
Ben: 3:30
That's fantastic and, I must say, it's so great for me to know you as a local Liverpool fan because, in the nature of the sporting world that we support, I know thousands of Liverpool fans, basically, and very few of them are from Liverpool. It is just the nature of the world we live in. So yeah, on that topic, how has your relationship with the club changed since you were a boy?
Michael: 3:53
Well, the success of the club has definitely improved since I was younger. This was an achievement I had more recently at Champions League and Premier League successes. But my relationship more broadly comes from embracing the positives that being a Liverpool fan has, but also being more acutely aware of some of the problems and some of the criticisms that you have around the relationships that the club has with other industries and the way they impact that they put out in terms of different areas as well. So I know these being like controversial sponsorship deals that you've been aware of in terms of some of these things and that kind of tarnishes, some of the kind of relationship that you do have to some extent in the disappointment in your club and the brand and the values of sport and the club you support being associated with those things. But also the disappointment in terms of the stuff that was surrounding the European Super League and things like that in terms of the commercialisation of football, as it definitely increased and not saying it didn't exist 20 years ago, but you've definitely seen that ramp up in the way Money controls football and controls sport more broadly. So it's definitely overall, it's still a great thing to be a small fan, still a great thing to be a football fan.
Ben: 5:13
Absolutely, and I think my friends who are Newcastle supporters will probably be a bit sick of me constantly getting a bit irritable about their current ownership model. Obviously, everyone knows about PSG's ownership model man City but let's keep focusing on Liverpool, let's try and be self-critical, because we're both Liverpool fans. What is Liverpool's sponsorship situation? Because I think just because the ownership may not be as starkly quite a quite irresponsible as some of the others doesn't mean that it's all sunshine and rainbows.
Michael: 5:45
No, absolutely, and Liverpool is a big culprit in terms of negative sponsorship deals that it does have it's front to. Shared sponsor is Standard Chartered Bank, which is a huge fossil fuel financer. There's a conversation that people don't always realise because most people in this country aren't able to have a standard Chartered Bank accounts, so a lot of people aren't familiar with what Standard Chartered is, let alone what their practices are and how they invest their money in other areas. For instance, like. One of the mind blown kind of figures for me is that in 2021 alone, standard Chartered Bank invested in fossil fuel expansion projects that will emit 2.3 billion tonnes of CO2 within those projects lifetime. That's five times the entire emissions of the UK 3.3 billion tonnes. I can't even comprehend how large a number that is and how much impact that that's going to have on our planet, the people that live on this planet and the future of sport, as well, as a knock on effect of that too. But the amount of money that's being plowed in is a standard, too, in terms of £46 billion has been plowed into fossil fuel expansion projects since 2016 by Standard Chartered. So these are large sums of money and huge, huge emissions, which is ultimately driving climate change and threatening the future of sport. And it doesn't stop there. Like the, liverpool itself has commercial partnerships with other industries and with other areas as well, such as Petro-Canada, which I think the name says on the tin, just quite what that's about there. It's just ludicrous, in my view, to be able to say which Liverpool does and is a signatory of the UN Sports and Climate Action Framework, based on its pledging commitment towards that. What has allowed and continues to push sponsorship deals with these climate reckon industries and climate reckon sponsors. I don't think those two things can mute and I don't think the representative of what the values of sport are. I don't think the representative of what the fans want the club to be representative of. Yeah, we love Liverpool. I love Liverpool as a football club. I live in the shadow of its stadium and, quite literally, I can see the stadium from my bedroom window. I love being a Liverpool fan. But that doesn't absolve us of responsibility to criticise the things that the club is doing wrong and the things that the club should be doing better and working to improve, and, I think, its sustainability of its commercial department and the relationship it strikes with sponsors should definitely be something that they improve on and be a focal point of the club moving forward, because ultimately, the research that is out there, sport is already being drastically impacted by the climate crisis and you won't see football by 2050. You'll see the majority of Premier League clubs experiencing fixture delays due to flooding and other weather events. That just won't be the same if sport doesn't get real and clubs don't get real and take climate action, not just about the sustainability of their stadiums and operations, but the brands that they promote. I think always one that strikes me as being quite ludicrous is the fact that Premier League has an official engine oil sponsor. Why is that a category of sponsorship that we need to have in football? It's a nonsense. Obviously you've got others that come in there, and every club, especially every Premier League club, will have relationships with the fossil fuel industry and will have relationships with industries that are problematic. You just look at the amount of clubs that have gambling sponsors as well. It's a huge, huge problem, and the social and climate impacts of sponsorship deals is something that I think sport needs to start really taking seriously.
Ben: 9:35
What do you think standard charters are getting out of it? Because, as you say, in the UK you can't open a standard chartered bank account. So what exactly are standard charters aims of being on Liverpool's front of shirt? Why are they giving them? I think it was 50 million quid a year. Why are they giving them that money?
Michael: 9:51
Well, quite simply, sponsorship works. People will start to associate this research out there that suggests that people will have that with the strong emotions that are surrounding their team and the sport they love. They'll start to associate positive emotions with the brands that are associated with that sponsor and with that company. A lot of people I speak to recognise standard charters as Liverpool's share sponsor, but they don't actually know much about standard charters, what its operations are more generally and whether it's a bank, especially with the large clubs. The international element means that it has a far greater reach than what, than just the UK viewership. In fact, with the lack of restrictions or less restrictions on watching matches and what not, around the globe compared to the UK, more people from countries where standard chartered bank does operate, we'll see more games and be more televised games than will be in the UK. So every time you see Mo Salah score a goal and standard chartered and blazing on the front of the shirt and it's beamed across the world and that positive association between Liverpool, that emotion that you're feeling and that brand is there. And these are the areas around the globe where standard chartered are invested in fossil fuel expansion projects Across Asia, across Africa and further afield as well, and what it'll try and do is it'll point to other things that we're working on to say, oh, we're doing this climate responsibly or what not? We're being more sustainable in this area, but ultimately they are still investing in fossil fuel expansion projects, whether that have been previous years and things like the liquefied natural gas pipeline in Mozambique and the devastation that that's caused and the this will continue to cause in terms of the extraction of gas, whether it be the jazan power plant and other projects that are invested in. There are doing numerous projects that are invested in.
Ben: 11:55
Yeah, I find these particular numbers quite hard to digest, just as a human being on planet earth, because there's always an argument between one's personal climate actions and the sort of systemic, more industrial ones, and I do think it's both. Some people say, oh, any form of carbon footprint is a myth and that you should just live your life and these oil companies are responsible, and that is to a degree true. But at the same time there are actions we can take in our daily lives to reduce our emissions. But then when you put the numbers there, it's quite demoralizing. I say, this summer, right, I've got a wedding in Italy, for example, in October, and I'm not going by plane, I'm going to get the train there. But one obviously check my privilege that I can get the train there, that I can afford it because the trains aren't cheap. But two, you know you're saving a sort of a couple hundred kilograms of CO2 by not taking that thing. And then you hear this number from standard charted and you're like, ah, it's frustrating. You know, it does sort of make you quite angry. And I think your point about Mozambique was an interesting one, where if you go to like Maputo and you walk around, I guarantee you. You will see a Liverpool shirt somewhere but one. I'm not blaming them for that. Of course they don't have to have that association, but it seems a weird concept that you could almost walk around with the branding of a company that is negatively impacting both planet and your country and you know fellow citizens but also be quite happy about it.
Michael: 13:13
No, absolutely, and all that is the design, isn't it? The design for sponsorship in sport is to create those positive relationships and the positive feelings that people have towards the brand and the clubs that they love to support. You're absolutely right. This doesn't shouldn't mean, in my view, that you shouldn't support Liverpool as a result of these things. I'm a massive Liverpool fan. I'll continue to be a massive Liverpool fan for my whole life and, however, it does give a responsibility of people who are aware of the situation of the sponsorships to use their voice to be able to call that out and to spread that message around the problems that it does have. I think that is, I think that's, the crucial thing, because these companies have global reach. Liverpool has a global reach, it reaches people right across the world and it has to be made aware and has to be called out that the practices of our main share sponsor are really, really damaging. They're awful, they're having awful consequences in the countries that they were expanding, doing the fossil fuel expansion projects in, and there hasn't a huge impact on the climate right across across the globe, and so I think it's important that we do call out these, these actions, especially for making the argument against fossil fuel banks which often is slightly more complicated, to kind of degree of separation that they use a sponsorship to be able to fund the fossil fuel industry, because it's the banks that are providing the money flashed the, the underwriting from insurance companies and whatnot, to be able to carry out the fossil fuel expansion projects that wouldn't happen without their support. So it's important to convey that message.
Ben: 14:49
We've talked about standard charter. We've talked about Petro-Canada. What do you think of something like Expedia, where they're not directly responsible for the emissions? You know the company of Expedia's carbon footprint isn't that high, but obviously if you watch Expedia advert you have Ewan McGregor or something telling you to hop on a plane which is high carbon footprint. What do you make of that kind of sponsorship?
Michael: 15:10
I think what you find with everyone who talks about high carbon sponsorship is that everyone will have a slightly different kind of like window in terms of like how far the nets should be cast in these things. Absolutely, it's promoting other industries and directing you to other industries that are high carbon related, obviously being air travel being that main one, and you see large examples of airlines being sponsored in the Premier League and in support, notably the Emirates and Etihad. It's definitely something that should be discussed and it should be something that is considered by commercial departments within clubs when they strike in these deals. It's comparative really, isn't it? In terms of the understanding that, yes, that's problematic and is related to the fossil fuel industry, but it's not the airline itself. So it's understanding that distinction and understanding that it is a negative sponsor, like it's not a sponsor that is going to be the best one to have in terms of if you're taking environmental impacts seriously, but it's not the same in terms of its direct impact as Standard Chartered Bank or Emirates Airlines or Etihad Airlines. So there's a complexity to that kind of discussion, but it's definitely something that I think should be included in the discussions that commercial departments are having in relation to sustainability, because it's really important that sustainability and the social impacts of sponsorships are really at the heart of what commercial departments are considering when they're striking new deals. And let's not make no bone to this Sport is a lucrative sponsorship opportunity for every company around the world. There's no shortage of companies that want to use sport to sponsor their brand. There's no shortage. I don't think there's probably very few companies that wouldn't want their company on the front of a Premier League shirt. So there are other opportunities out there for sponsorship to bring the revenue into clubs. That doesn't have to rely on the fossil fuel or high carbon industries to do that.
Ben: 17:09
Yeah, you're highlighting some interesting ones. I think the downside of the bad companies, I guess, is that the companies that are the most quote unquote, exploitative or who are taking these mining bets fossil fuel bets, whatever bets and that's paying off. You know, sadi Ramco is the biggest company in the world, most profitable company in the world have the money to tempt in the most of the goodwill institutions, like whatever Liverpool or such, or even, for example, someone like you and McGregor, but on top of that, they have the most incentive to do so because people have pissed off at them because of their dodgy action. So it's a little bit of chicken and the egg of like. The bad ones have the money and the most incentive to give you the money. You know, I feel terrible for an organization like Forest Green Rovers, because how do they go around and get a sustainable sponsor that'll give them a huge amount of money? I'm sure some will give them some money, but they just know that some vegan food companies don't actually need that much of a you know, image cleanse. They might need a bit of more reach and of course, there'll still be the aim for that, but they might not need a bit of image cleanse.
Michael: 18:13
And you're right in saying that the ones with the most money are the people, the companies that can stack up the most offers in terms of giving clubs money for sponsorship deals. However, as a percentage, in terms of what they give, based on their overall investments and other things, it's incredibly small amount of money in individual deals. And that's not to say that increasing the amount of sponsorship deals would make these sponsorships goods or better. It absolutely wouldn't. But to point out the fact that you mentioned before, it's believed that standard chartered deal would live across around 50 million pounds a year. That is a fraction, a fraction of 1% that they've come into the fossil fuel industry since the signing of the Parrot Accord. That's an insubstantial amount of money to them for the benefit that they get from that, the amount of people that reaches so. It's always important, I think, to contextualize that. You know the way football and finances have gone recently. 50 million pounds isn't a huge, huge sum of money in the wide scope of the scheme of things. They are like, you see, the Champions League drop Gazprom overnight, essentially after the Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and replaced it relatively quickly with another sponsor, and that wasn't difficult for them to do, and the finances were impacted by that, that the cost of the deal was similar. I think it may have even been slightly higher. So they are companies out there and you're right as well. Between the different leagues and the different levels of the game at different points, the size of those deals will vary.
Ben: 19:53
You raise a valid point there about the that they were able to get a new sponsor that quickly after Gazprom. So why didn't they just get one in the first place? Why did it take an invasion of a sovereign nation to change sponsorships? And I mean, if I'm gonna take the Nihilist view and I don't have this view in my day-to-day life but to take the Nihilist view, I'm almost annoyed. The standard charted we don't ask standard charted for more. Like you know, they're giving us well, we just signed McAllister for 35 million. They're giving us 1.7 McAllisters per season, basically to get their brand on the front of every eyeball who watches a game of Champions League football. It seems well not Champions League next year.
Michael: 20:32
That's a sore spot that is Ben!
Ben: 20:36
Champions League winning football in the last couple of years, Premier League winning football in the last couple of years, and they only gave us 50 million, Like it just seems like Liverpool sort of had a completely morally bankrupt themselves for, as you say, not that huge amount of money in the grand scheme.
Michael: 20:52
Absolutely and obviously I don't hold the view that increasing that to any sum of money would make that sponsor any better in any way, shape or form. But it does put into context the value that these companies are able to get In relation to the cost that they're paying. Ultimately, these companies sponsor sports and sponsor football because it works, because it produces more money for them than they have put on else. And it's obvious why there is when you see, in terms of comparatives to means, the amount of money, that the profits that these companies makes, what they're giving in sponsorship deals, are really small amounts of money in comparison to the rest of the profits and industries You're right to say like it's in the nihilist view, people are like, oh well, they can afford to give more. But that is not the solution to this. The solution is to move away from these industries and move into less problematic industries and industries that aren't causing social harm to people who consume sports or to the planet as well.
Ben: 21:53
And I think, going back to the sort of airline points or the travel points, it becomes quite difficult when it becomes quite difficult for these organizations not to do it, when I think the bigger distance involved, the more money can be leveraged. And I'll give you example Obviously, the most recent Champions League final was in Istanbul and really cool organizations like Fossil Free Football were saying well, hang on, it's an Italian team playing a team from Manchester, why not have the game in Paris, like it was last year? And it makes it so geographically reasonable. But of course, the entire buildup to the final involved, you know, Liverpool's very own Steven Gerrard in a sponsorship campaign from Turkish Airlines, because they're not hosting the final, because the owners of Turkish Airlines want to watch football, even though they may do. They're hosting the final there because they can use that event and the eyeballs to incentivize people to travel to these places. And then I think we get there's a knowing thing where they kind of want to offset the guilt of the travel onto the end consumer. And me, being an end consumer in this case, then feels the guilt because, you know, then suddenly my friend, because they watched the Champions League finals, says, oh, I want to do my destination wedding in Istanbul. That's great, that's cool. But then I'm now that goes sitting at home turning down my friend's wedding because I can't get to Istanbul without hopping on a plane. So you know they almost create the problem and then say to the consumer you solve it if you care about sustainability. So it's a really fierce cycle, of which football and you know sport in general is tied up in.
Michael: 23:25
Yeah, you're absolutely right, and what you've just described there is literally the reason why they want to sponsor sports. Why these industries want to sponsor sports gets the positive relationship. It creates revenue for them. To do so creates opportunities that they can tap into to make themselves more money and make their businesses even more profitable. Because these aren't industries, by the way, these aren't companies that are struggling to get money. These aren't companies that are struggling to get by. They want to increase their profit margins even more so in a way that is completely unsustainable within the planet, as it is currently in the climate crisis that we face, and one of the impacts of the climate crisis is that, within the next few decades, sport will be un-recognisable. You see how frequently the sport encounters are disrupted now, in terms of sport and weather instances around the world flooding, extreme heat. You've seen today some of the reports. I think there was an article in Reuters talking about the Mexican national games, where these teams that have matches are being canceled. Teams have walked off the pitch, athletes have been hospitalized due to extreme heat and the extreme weather there. You've seen grand prix flooded off. You've seen football matches around the world cancels for weather events, and this is only going to get worse, is the climate crisis gripped harder, the devastation in terms of that is going to happen to the planet is going to worsen and the impact that it'll have on fans, athletes and the sport and calendar is going to be even larger. And this is why it's now is the time as the climate crisis grips harder. Now is really the time for governing bodies, for sports teams and sports organisations to really serious the issues of sustainability and include sponsorship deals in them, because it's really important that they do the things they can to make their stadiums and make their operations as sustainable as possible, but to ignore the fact that they're promoting hugely, hugely polluting industries and fossil fuel banks and fossil fuel companies is completely counter the trying to make by making their stadiums and their operations more sustainable. Like you look around at some of the most egregious examples of fossil fuel sponsorship in world football and you look at the African corporations which are sponsored by Total, which is just completely outrageous to be able to do that, and they still use their brand to sponsor sports right across the world and they're having a devastating. Total's operations are having this devastating impact on the planet, the people all over the world and the communities where they're having their fossil fuel expansion projects, and for sports to kind of tend to blind eye to that is unsustainable, it's completely ridiculous and it's immoral. And sports need to look those arguments right in the face and resolve them and move to sever the relationships that they have with these industries, because sports should be used as a vehicle for good and not to threaten the future of sport itself and have a devastating impact on people on planet.
Ben: 26:37
I think the Africa one is a super complex situation where, from particularly a macro perspective, it's hard to say that Africa doesn't deserve money being put in, you know. So, in theory, if those Total investments would be trickling down through the system and helping people in underdeveloped regions, et cetera, et cetera, you could maybe make the argument. But one I'm not always sure if that is the case and it's very hard to verify that that's the case and two, it does set up this weird incentive that I think a lot of billionaires and big companies run into where it almost seems to suit you the best, to do something wrong, do something bad, do something that exploits either other human beings or the environment, leverage a huge amount of money from that or gain a huge amount of money from that. Then take some of that money and put it to something like a sports tournament or a rewilding project or anything like that, and say look at the great thing we're doing, which you can't. Then say that's not a great thing you're doing. You know I can't specifically say Total's money into African football is a bad thing, but of course, what are they leveraging back? They're leveraging a false reputation. We're saying that Total is a quote, unquote. Good company and it never balances out. They're never putting in enough money into Africa. Then they're taking out of Africa in the form of fossil fuel expansion and human exploitation. So it's a really frustrating thing that you know. If you go on the internet you'll see. You won't believe what this person has done good with their money. But where do they get the money? And yeah, obviously, particularly in the cases of companies, they're faceless organizations. There's no individual that is masterminding this, so it's almost impossible to say that they're who's doing the wrong thing. But it's very interesting.
Michael: 28:17
But what you've described there quite eloquently is what greenwashing and sportswashing is, and they use this to launder the reputations and to promote a positive image for themselves, whilst doing things that are completely immoral and morally bankrupt and damaging to people and planning. I understand you're saying like, obviously African football deserves investments and whatnot. That is not going to that I'm making. But the investments that they're getting from a fossil fuel company, directly from a fossil fuel company, threatens the future of football and threatens the planet and threatens the livelihoods and the communities of people right across the world and within the communities within Africa with some of the fossil fuel expansion projects that they're directly involved with there. So that's why they do it through greenwashing and sportswashing to say, oh, we've used this money to do this great project or that great project. But when you kind of put that into perspective and turn to their operations and the impact that they're more broadly having, they're far less significant than the negative impact that they're having. So I understand the argument that the football needs investment and whatnot, or it should not be reliant and should not be taking money from the industries that are threatening the future of sport.
Ben: 29:37
I think also it's so difficult when the distances and the disconnect you have from these companies Like if I was to come up with some kind of real world example if we were in the neighborhood and someone had, like, a lemonade stand and they had cut costs on their lemonade production by putting rotten lemonade in the lemonade but making a profit on doing so, and then reinvested that profit into, like a local swimming pool, but we all got sick from the lemons. We wouldn't say, oh, well, done for building a swimming pool. Thank you very much. How the hell did you just do that? But because these companies are miles away, we don't necessarily directly see every day the actions on the ground and all this kind of stuff, particularly for people in these situations in Africa, that they only maybe see in the short term. Oh, but a money coming in from total, that's fine, cool, Great. But of course, if you take the systems perspective or the broads perspective, like this is not sustainable exactly as you phrase. But now let's talk about your work, because obviously all my listeners will hear the passion that you talk about, the stuff and the details that you have. How have you turned all of your passion and motivation and fixing the system into a career?
Michael: 30:47
So I began where I first met you, ben, a few years back, working for an organization called Ploughful, and I was a freelancer at the time and I was involved with a few others in running a campaign called Fossil Free LFC and that was directly as this conversation started with about the relationship between Liverpool Football Club and Standard Chartered Bank, and through that way I got involved with discussions with fans. I think, within this whole kind of sustainability and campaign and then trying to change this, the way football uses sponsorship and the sustainability is both involving fans in that discussion and part of that campaign is crucial. One of the things that regularly came up during discussions with fans is once they conveyed the message of the problems around Standard Chartered and they would broadly accept that Standard Chartered were not a good company to sponsor Liverpool was the fact that there was an understanding that there were other areas of sponsorship that are negative, and I now work for platform and we're working on the campaign and the sponsorship pledge that drives together those three areas in terms of the clubs, fans and athletes to bring those people together to campaign about what we're calling harmful sponsorship, and those harmful sponsorship are present that we're looking at in terms of the campaigns that exist the High Carbon, which is what I've discussed here quite in depth with yourself today, and gambling companies and the alcohol industry as well. All of those have got established campaigns in different areas and what not? Against those types of sponsorship. Because what I see this is a pledge to bring those stakeholders for sport, but that's broadly what they are. The clubs, the fans, the athletes bring those people together to break what I describe as the cycle of harmful sponsorship, how we switch between these harmful sponsors. Like you go back, and tobacco sponsorship was the only sponsorship in town in sports and practically anything at one stage. If it wasn't sponsored by Tobacco, then it wasn't happening at one point, and now that became a thing of the past. And alcohol industries, gambling industries, high carbon industries came into that space within sport, within football, and they chop and change between those industries. What this pledge aims to do is to bring together all those groups of people that I've just described to break that cycle, to say our sport, our clubs, our teams that we love to support don't need to be reliant on money from these industries. It causes harm to fans and it threatens the future of the game. So we need to be really engaged in those three areas, get as many mobilised behind the pledge that we've referred to as the game changer sponsorship pledge, because that's what we're really ultimately hoping to do. We're hoping to change the game. It's hoping that this will be a game changer in the way that we review sports sponsorship moving forward. We've spoke a lot about football, but this is not narrowly minded through trouble. This is a sports sponsorship pledge. So we want to engage with all sports, we want to engage with all sporting organisations and we want to go with those people on a journey from that acceptance to commitment of not extending deals, not renewing deals, not signing deals with these industries and that's what I hope this really does as an opportunity to do, but really positively for a sport that can continue to thrive. We've talked about all the negatives of these relationships that exist, but it doesn't have to be that way. Our engagements within this process and our campaign and our voices do matter because, as you've heard the phrase all the time and I think sports fans are key to this, because you'll hear it in football all the time and across all the sports Sport without fans is nothing. So the voice of fans, the voice of athletes, is really, really important within this in bringing these areas together and really putting these discussions on the agenda so that the powers that be, the organisations, the government bodies that make these decisions, the clubs and the organisations, can't ignore it. They can't ignore it. We have to put it on the agenda and they have to take us seriously. We've got to come together and create the environment where they can't ignore us, where they have to take us seriously, where they have to start to take action, because at some point that we know in terms of high carbon frontiers, they must know that at some point that it will be unignorable. And what we're asking them to do is to get on board early. I say early, get on board earlier, before any legislative change is going to come in and be part of the change that we can actually see in sports, to try and protect its future and protect its fans and supporters and the athletes that compete in it.
Ben: 35:47
Yeah, I think there's definitely a first mover advantage here, and it seems ridiculous that we have to say the phrase first mover when it comes to climate in 2023. But if you can get on the record now and say that this stuff's got to change from, as you say, industry stakeholder perspective, it's a huge advantage. Because the point that once football stadiums are literally regularly under water, you're not going to get any brownie points, quote unquote by saying, oh yeah, we need to do something about climate. It has to be now or probably 10 years ago, but here we are now. And I also think one of the struggles when it comes to this kind of changes communication, coordination I think you'll often find a couple of stakeholders are sort of separated, but they actually think in the same way. So your, your idea here of bringing people together, coming up with some kind of cohesive next step, and you guys providing the pun intended platform for that next step, is exceptionally powerful. I'd also say that, first of all, football without without devokary is nothing. That's one thing we must remember. But exactly that you know, as soon as the, the, the fans, get involved at a quite a substantive level, then exactly, football without fans is nothing and, as you say, that applies to all sports, not just football. And this is, I think, a really exciting next step. What? What's the actual process for clubs to get involved? You know, if there's a club listening to this right now, what would you said them in terms of how they can join this, this action?
Michael: 37:11
So we'll hope to have, by the time this goes out we hope to that this will have launched as a pledge and and it'll be hosted, and this work is being will be hosted in partnership with both platform and bad reticent and the pledge will be hosted on both of those websites and the contact information will be included on those websites. And any organization that wants to get involved and wants to sign up, wants to have a conversation, wants to discuss this more, will be able to get in contact with myself and we can. We can discuss that further. See, the more people that pledge support and sign up for, the better what we want to have sessions with people to. We understand that that if it's clubs that want to go on board, that they'll probably be a journey and these are the that those clubs need to go on, because I don't think these are and I don't can't think of a club off the top of my head that doesn't have a relationship with at least one of these industries covered in the sponsorship pledge. So there will be a journey that some of these sports teams and organizations will need to go on. So that starts with the recognition that these sponsorship, sponsorship from these industries, is harmful and we need to move away from them to safeguard sport and to safeguard our supporters and to safeguard society more broadly. And I think that's that's, that's the starting point to get in touch once once, once we're launched which should be when this goes out and having contact. If you're interested in speaking more, if you want, if you've got an organization, if you've got a link to an organization that you think could be, would be keen to discuss this further, then I'm available and always open to discussion and engaging and trying to make positive change happen.
Ben: 38:49
How would you say this pledge that you're putting forward differs from, like sports for climate action framework, which so many organizations have put their hands up and said, oh, yes, yes to this, but then it didn't seem to go one step beyond? How are you guys going to ensure that, once people have bought you know, bought into the the principle that they take those next steps?
Michael: 39:09
And so I think the terms of the commitments are within our pledge, specifically around sponsorship or calling for a move in the way from those areas of sponsorship. So these are much more tangible recourse, to kind of point out a form of hypocrisy. So if someone signs up to say we've committed to phasing out these industries, or whatever stage we've phased out this industry that we've described in this with a view to phasing out more, you can tangibly see through their commercial relationship and their sponsorship deals whether they are doing that or not. We don't want this to be taken as the opportunity to be a greenwashing exercise for clubs to go We've signed this, we've done great things, kind of things. We definitely want to make sure that these, like the commitment to doing this, is a commitment to actually carrying out what they, what they say they're going to do. And I think, with it being about sponsorship and it discusses sponsorship in a way that the framework doesn't and an existence of harm, and I think for clubs to step up and take that responsibility will show that they're ahead of the well, will be ahead of the curve of most football and sporting clubs out there that haven't yet or won't want to accept the harm that these industries do.
Ben: 40:23
That's a really smart way of doing it. I think a lot of the goods that comes in sport is actually quite intangible, and then I think some sports clubs may like to pretend that some of the bad stuff is also intangible. As you say, something like a sponsorship thing is very black and white on paper. It's very tangible. So the actions are there, like on the 1st of July or wherever, baby, you have this sponsor, where you at 1st of July 2024, where you in the 1st of July 2025. If you still got the sponsors, you're still doing the wrong thing. So that's that's quite exciting, I think. Just to sort of end this conversation, I always like to try and find some, some positivity on this and I think your passion is really speaking through here. But how optimistic are you about? You know won the success of this campaign. But on top of that, just in the change of the industry, do you believe that the industry can change in a meaningful and responsible way?
Michael: 41:13
Well, I'm positive about the fact that I want to reach as many people as I can with this discussion. Do I think that in the immediate term, we're going to see the largest clubs around the world sign up to this? No, I don't. But do I think that we can create positive change by engaging with fans and engaging with athletes and engaging with the clubs at different levels of the game? We start putting this as a discussion point and start putting this on the agenda. We have these discussions because we need to make these, these arguments and put them on the agenda. They need to be in a position where they can't be ignored, and they will be ignored unless, unless we shout loud enough, unless we start making actions and doing things that mean they can't ignore us in this way. And this is a positive way of doing this in terms of getting people on board and engaging with clubs and try and get them on this journey with us to be ahead of the curve of what a lot of sports clubs are. I do think these are a lot of positivity to have. I think these lots of options as I've set out earlier for clubs to look elsewhere for sponsorship deals and not be reliant on these industries? Do I think this is a huge, a huge task? Absolutely Do. I think it's going to be a long term thing to try and get to the point where we need to be in relation to sports and sponsorship? Yes, it is. That conversation has to start somewhere and I'm positive about the fact that this conversation is starting. You see recently, more and more discussions around sponsors and the relationship sponsors have with sports, and we've got to be positive about that, because people do care. People rarely do care and you engage with them, engage with sports fans, you engage with athletes, you're great with organisations and you see that people care and that's what makes me positive. When I have conversations with people and they go, this is really great. We need more of this. What can we do to support this? It's something that gives me a real optimism that change can happen. Change can happen and we need to harness that enthusiasm. We need to harness the care and the passion that people have around sports and wanting to save God, fans and the future of sports itself in a real positive way. I think this sponsorship pledge the Game Changer Sponsorship Pledge really offers that positive opportunity to be optimistic that we can bring all areas of sport together.
Ben: 43:23
That's a very strong note to end on. I think you're hitting on so many great things there. On Nudge Theory Change doesn't happen until someone starts or someone tries. What a fantastic initiative. Even the work you've done since I've known you has been pretty spectacular in starting these conversations. Thank you, I wouldn't even have believed something like this, even in its current form, would have existed two, three years ago. That's really amazing. Yeah, just to end, michael, thank you so much for your time. Thank you so much for your work and keep it up.
Michael: 43:51
Wonderful. Thanks very much for inviting me on, Ben. It's been a pleasure.
Ben: 44:02
That was our conversation with Michael Hardy. Just to reflect from that conversation, I would like to acknowledge that as fans it's hard to watch other teams making big money signings and go on to victory while your team struggles, and it's very tempting to insist your team does the same kind of deals. But such actions are unsustainable long term, both for sport and for the planet, and the collective action of all of us means that clubs can compete on a more financially fair playing field and without the feeling of guilt in the back of our minds. Just to reinforce that statistic that Michael gave us from marketforcesorg, the fossil fuel projects that Standard Chart had funded in 2021 will end up emitting 2.3 billion tons of carbon dioxide equivalent over their lifetime, which is more than five times the entire of the UK's annual emissions. Are we to allow such reckless profiteering to be legitimized by sport? If you think not, then you can find the links to the game changer sponsors you've pledged in the episode description. That's all for today. Thank you for listening. Please subscribe or give the show a rating on your podcast Up Of Choice, if you have not already, and I will see you for the next episode, a conversation on a different but very related field. Thanks for watching. Until next time. Have a nice day, bye.