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Ticket Touting

It is a pleasure to participate in the debate. I begin, as others have done, by congratulating the Chairman of the Select Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford (Mr. Whittingdale), on what seems to have been the Herculean task of reaching some form of consensus. For some of us here who are observers, this has been an education in how Parliament and democracy work and how consensus can be achieved. I wonder whether the Labour party would like to employ him to debate the 10p tax rate issues with which it is dealing—perhaps he could achieve consensus on that. He certainly needs to be congratulated, as do other members of the Committee, on scrutinising these important issues and bringing them to our attention today. It is also good to see that the Gallery is packed with interested people. I do not know how much they paid for their tickets, how they purchased them and whether they had to pay over the odds, but it is good to see that there is huge and genuine interest in this issue. I hope that this is not the end of the discussion. I do not wish to put more of a burden on the Chairman, but there are some outstanding questions. I know that the Minister will be talking about some ideas, but with the advent of the Office of Fair Trading report, it might be an idea for the Select Committee to consider the guidelines that everyone wants to push towards, and for a wider debate to take place on that, so that we can see whether that is exactly where we want to go. A good starting point is a definition of touting, because people have chosen various angles, depending on the argument that they are advancing and where they are coming from. We have heard the flasher mac argument about the dodgy person who is trying to sell a ticket as people are going towards a football ground. We have also heard about the perhaps more legitimate systems, such as those on the internet, whether that involves Seatwave, viagogo or eBay. We need to distinguish between the two. The secondary market can certainly work legitimately, and it seems to work well, but in other ways it can be very much like the black market at work. We need legislation or guidance to tackle both aspects. The secondary market is invaluable to some, and perhaps the only way for people to secure tickets that they are not able to purchase when they first come on to the market. Others, however, see it as parasitic and questionable to profit from the entertainment industry and to deny it much needed revenue. From a parliamentary perspective, our objective is to ensure that tickets reach genuine fans at sensible prices. However, I go further. Once they have reached genuine fans, it is up to them to decide whether they want to go to that event or to sell the ticket—because they cannot go or for any other reason. As my hon. Friend the Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford said, the internet has changed how tickets are distributed. The pace at which tickets are sold is astonishing. We heard today that they can be sold out even before they are due to be launched, so perhaps the Minister will comment on that. My hon. Friend mentioned Getmetickets, the organisation that came and went—it also came in other forms—but that is a particularly negative aspect of the internet. Although guidance is required, Seatwave, viagogo and eBay are certainly heading in the right direction for a secondary market. However, even with the advent of the internet, Parliament's role has not changed. We must ensure that the consumer is protected and that funding for arts and entertainment is not challenged. We must also be aware of the trends and changes taking place in the £1 billion industry. The Opposition are generally supportive of the Committee's report, and believe that an all-out ban on the resale of tickets would not be beneficial to the consumer, nor practical or workable for promoters. However, many people argue that such a ban already exists. There are already outright bans in specific cases, such as for football matches and the Olympics. We should deal with those one at a time. In football, there are security reasons for such a ban regarding the division of fans and so forth. However, the examples given today show that the system does not work, and that it is not properly scrutinised. It is easy to pick up tickets from touts. Not all clubs provide a resale opportunity, so once someone has a ticket, there is no legitimate way of handing it back to the club for it to be sold on. The football industry needs to consider that problem. When Seb Coe put forward the idea that London should host the Olympics, one condition was that tickets could not be resold. Then there are the crown jewel events, with which I shall deal in a moment. However, we agree that attempting to ban the secondary market would be wrong. It is worth considering where tickets go. For instance, just over 3 million tickets were sold for the 2006 World cup in Germany. Only 1 million were for global public sale, and the other 2 million or so went to a variety of other places, such as sponsors, and for hospitality. Some went to the German football family—I do not know whether that was for Franz Beckenbauer, or a larger group—and the international football family. It must be possible for the organisations themselves to do more to ensure that tickets get to genuine fans. That should not involve Parliament or the Government; it should be a corporate responsibility, and a corporate duty, for those organisations to ensure the wider distribution of tickets. I was interested to read the report produced by Campbell and Keen Ltd. I do not know whether the company was working for the Government, but its recommendations were clear. It believes that there is no role for further legislation, but it makes clear that more can be done, and better, to co-ordinate certain aspects. I was interested to hear the hon. Member for Bath (Mr. Foster) say that there is no association or body to knock heads together so that a collective view can be taken. I shall leave it to the hon. Gentleman to recommend the formation of a union to get action. However, Ticketmaster has made its views clear, as have viagogo and eBay. They all say that they do not want legislation, but they all put up their hands to say that there should be much better co-operation and that there is a demand for guidelines. The Government have a responsibility for leadership to ensure that such guidelines are produced. I now turn to the crown jewels—the key national events in which we take such pride. Because we have no guidelines, I cannot see the situation coming to fruition immediately, but I would encourage that to happen. The view has been expressed that such events are of national importance and that they should be given some protection. However, we are concerned about spreading that out to other events. Another concern is that some events—particularly a cricket event, I think—want to remove themselves from that status because they believe that they might gain more money by doing so. The Government should be aware of the desire to opt out. The Government's response to the Committee's report said that they would introduce a limit on the number of tickets sold to each person, with clear refund policies, improved distribution, allocation exchange arrangements, and fair terms and conditions. We agree that that is going in the right direction, but we want more detail on how it will be achieved. A series of examples has been given today showing that that will be hard to police. As I said earlier, making changes was a Labour manifesto commitment in 1997. I thought that the sale of the Tote was the longest uncompleted Labour commitment, but improvements to the guidelines on ticket touting is another. I was slightly confused by the Government's press release. It first said:"““These improvements can happen without the burden of new regulation, by criminalising fans who want to buy tickets for sold-out events or sell tickets that they cannot use””," but it was quickly changed to say:"““These improvements can happen without the burden of new regulation, or criminalising fans””." I am pleased to say that the Conservative press office came to the Government's aid to ensure that the right message was sent out. I am concerned about the number of convictions relating to ticket touting. Over the last seven years, there have been 150, which is scandalous. It suggests that although we have legislation, it is not effectively implemented. My hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies)—he knows more about handbags and prostitution than I gave him credit for—said that the police have other things to do at football matches. I agree in part, but we have moved into a different world. I would like to see a policeman walk up to a ticket tout and say, ““Move along, please””, and not have to spend seven minutes filling out a form, with all the attendant problems. The police should simply do their duty and push those people away rather than turning a blind eye to their activities. That would be a step in the right direction. If we make touting illegal, the law will have to be enforced, because otherwise what is the point? The Minister should recognise that there is a lack of enforcement. Indeed, I hope that he will comment on the matter. My first intervention on my hon. Friend the Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford was to ask about the Office of Fair Trading report and model terms and conditions. I was pleased that the Minister jumped up immediately to say that they are about to be published.