Trust Meeting With SSMC

Only a very brief update on this one but we wanted to make people aware of where we were following a meeting this week with officials from the Liberty Stadium regards atmosphere within the stadium itself.

There have been seemingly an increase in complaints in recent weeks regarding the stewarding of the crowd on matchdays and we wished to raise these issues on behalf of the fans as well as see if there was anyway that we could work with the stadium to improve the atmosphere within the stadium.

Officials from the Liberty Stadium were very receptive to an open dialogue between the Trust and themselves and this will become hopefully a regular feature. This can only benefit the fans with a greater understanding of the rules and regulations (red tape) that govern football stadia and who sets the rules.

Disappointingly, the club have received complaints via the football league regards the conduct of some of their own fans at the Liberty on matchdays from neutral supporters within the stadium.

However, the main issues on discussion were the atmosphere and the increased complaints. There has not been a clamp down on the issue of standing but we have to re-iterate that all-seater stadiums are governed by strict laws which came about from the Taylor Report. These rules clearly state that persistent standing should not be allowed. Whether fans agree with this statement or not, it is not something that officials at the Liberty Stadium can change and it will not change unless the government change their rulings on this. This is something that the Trust have been well aware of and whilst the complaints have been taken forward there was never an agenda to discuss a safe standing area – this cannot be set by anybody connected with the Stadium or the Football Club.

The Football Club themselves have been very receptive to the concept of increasing the noise within the stadium on matchdays and one of the aims of the meeting was to try and find a suggestion where this could be implemented whilst remaining within the stadium rules.

The stadium officials were clear that they wish to allow fans to create an atmosphere and that they did not ask people to sit down immediately when standing to chant or also at times of excitement (goal mouth action and the like). However, they cannot accept persistent standing within the stadium. It was accepted that at other grounds fans are able to stand and these are items under discussion currently with safety officers from other grounds. It is also noted that some of the safety rules are set by the local safety committees and the like and the enforcement of these can vary from ground to ground. We are in constant discussion with other grounds and safety officers to see how other grounds operate.

The Trust put forward a couple of suggestions to try and improve the atmosphere that were well received but cannot be agreed until ratified by the Safety Advisory Group (SAG) who will be meeting next week . A further update will be provided on these at that stage.

We do appreciate that from the meeting we have nothing concrete to state regards the updates but it was pleasing to note that the officials of the stadium management team are happy to discuss these matters with the Trust and will continue to do so.

A further update should follow next week.