Prime Minister Andy Burnham has denied Manchester City representatives raised the Premier League charges against the club during his past meetings with them.
The former Mayor of Manchester was forced to address accusations that he had fudged the truth after reports this week suggested meetings with senior Manchester City figures, notably chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak, which appeared in his register of interests had been removed from the internet.
Burnham stated that City “didn’t raise those issues with me” when quizzed in the House of Commons, saying that he was very happy for “everything to set out in full”. Leader of the opposition Kemi Badenoch quipped that the Prime Minister was “tying himself in knots”, adding that he was “bumbling into a row still ongoing about Manchester City” with a statement that “isn’t going to suffice”, or go away.
It came after the chair of the Independent Football Regulator, David Kogan, warned this week that he would resign from his post if Burnham or his front bench meddled in proceedings relating to City, who were last month found guilty of systematic breaches of financial rules over a nine-year period.
The regulator has the power to force Sheikh Mansour to sell the club, despite Burnham raising concerns about its possible effect on Manchester if the club’s UAE owners – who have invested heavily in the area – pulled out.
Burnham in Man City mess?
Burnham pointed MPs to a statement made by the Greater Manchester Combined Authority in response to the question on Manchester City, which appears to suggest that his once declared meetings were as a “guest at home fixtures”.
But it raises questions as to whether simply being a “guest at home fixtures” is comparable to having dinner with the Manchester City chairman. Furthermore, Burnham said his only “significant meeting” with Al Mubarak was in 2021 – at the UK’s Global Investment Summit – which raises further questions as to why some meetings with the chair were deemed significant but others weren’t.
In all, the former Mayor accepted Manchester City-funded freebies worth over £1,000.
“Our independence is absolute, and my independence personally is absolute,” said Kogan, who previously donated to the Labour leadership campaigns of Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy and Burnham’s predecessor Keir Starmer, at the launch of its State of the Game report on Tuesday.
“I made it very clear last year that any form of political interference in the way we operate is going to result in my resigning from this role, and I stand by that completely.”