The pro supporters project Ireland coordinator provided an overview of the pro supporters project, while Kevin Miles from the football supporters federation in the UK touched on a range of relevant themes, including:
• The importance of communication- dialogue as a two way process
• Effective channels to allow two way communications with a need for a multi-agency approaches to address concerns with mutually positive outcomes for all parties
• Supporter led engagement events/initiatives and their role in emphasising the positives but also changing negative tones/reputations which can often be set by a minority.
• Be clear on what supporters can do with respect to violent behavior (roles and boundaries- Police will often need to deal with public order offences).
• Need for dialogue with supporters so actions by authorities, which can set the tone and impact supporters are designed and implemented with due regards to supporters views.
• Supporters part of the solution not just problem
Interactive discussion and possible solutions
This background helped to set the scene for a useful and interactive discussion on the Irish context, which touched on:
• Communication-reliable accurate information for fans (example of fans being held back after games and how no communication on the reason for this can lead to frustration- comment also on ‘holdback’ and its potential to provide an opportunity for people looking for confrontation- therefore a need to consider how this is communicated).
• Some views that violence is minimal and potentially opportunistic in the Irish context, while others underscored the need to be aware of the potential for organised forms of violence/anti social behaviour. On the whole the suggestion was that violence whatever its form, took place outside the stadium and not inside.
• Need for dialogue between supporters and a range of stakeholders so that supporter’s voice and opinions are heard and taken onboard, especially with respect to actions that effect supporters (e.g. pre-match meetings that cover policing measures/approaches/security). Supporters develop relationship with superintendant around policing approaches.
• Need for dialogue with media- supporter’s voice important to get this across especially when negative issues are being addressed in the media but also to cover positive engagement events run by supporters for supporters • Need to address negative reputations often created by a minority but impacting the majority (engagement opportunity/events between supporters to emphasis the positive, retake reputation and address negative reputations- even if events are very small scale to beginning with).
• Forum to convey supporters voice, this could feed into multi-stakeholder meetings
• Supporter’s champions (Fan advocates) needed.
• The issue of intolerance as it refers to racism was not covered extensively and the general feeling seemed to be that Racism was not a major organised issue within the National League, though some previous incidents had received media profile
• Multi-stakeholder forum as a two way feedback/communication network/mechanism, allowing identified universal concerns to be fed back and addressed.
The round tables are part of the EU project "pro supporters - Prevention through empowerment", which is coordinatet by FairPlay and supported by the European Commission in the area of violence prevention and fight against intolerance in sport.