When Euro 2024 starts next week, it will be the first time that a men’s international football tournament has clashed with a UK general election since 1970.
Back then, England’s early exit from the World Cup was blamed for an unexpected Labour defeat. This year, political parties and the media are trying to work out how wall-to-wall football will affect general election coverage – and whether voters will tune out of politics.
Jonathan Munro, the deputy CEO of BBC News, said the clash was “quite a nightmare” and the broadcaster was operating at “maximum stretch” in terms of its physical capacity to cover events. “We’ve not had to stop doing anything because of kit availability. But we could do without another major news story,” he said.
Munro added that Euro 2024 had severely limited the potential dates for televised leaders’ debates, even when there is a gap in the BBC’s schedule. “There are evenings when England and Scotland are playing on ITV, so you wouldn’t want to put on one of our major election programmes,” he said.
Equally, Munro said the corporation could not risk scheduling a debate after a football match that could over-run: “You get into parts of the tournament when extra time can be a factor.”
There are also the inadvertent side-effects of football clashing with a general election campaign. If a political story leads the news bulletin after an England or Scotland game, it’s likely to reach millions more voters.
Many of these extra viewers may be happy, upset, or drunk – and not in the mood for listening to an update on Keir Starmer or Rishi Sunak.
Coverage of Euro 2024 was already complicated by the clash with Wimbledon, which enjoys two weeks of wall-to-wall tennis coverage across the BBC. The broadcaster’s resources are already stretched by commitments to cover this month’s Glastonbury festival and the 80th anniversary of D-day.
Clare Balding, who hosts the BBC’s Wimbledon coverage, was due to co-present Channel 4’s election night coverage. Louisa Compton, the broadcaster’s head of news and current affairs, said she had pulled out as “even superwoman Clare Balding can’t be in two places at once”.
ITV has already had to move an England women’s international football match to ITV4 to avoid it clashing with first leaders’ debate.
Politicians are also trying to work out how to mix politics and football without looking opportunistic, while avoiding the cliche of a posed photo of a party leader settling down to watch the football.
Starmer is expected to lean into his love of Arsenal, having repeatedly emphasised that he is a real fan who watches “from the stands” rather than in a corporate box.
Sunak is a fan of Southampton FC and is known for talking at length with Saints-supporting political journalists about the team’s performance. Yet he chose to skip the side’s Championship playoff victory at Wembley, avoiding the risk of a stadium chanting abuse at him.
When the Sun asked him about England’s potential performance, he attempted to flip it into an uncomfortable attack on Labour. “When it comes to the football, I tell you the country they shouldn’t just be worried about the Danes, Slovenians and the Serbs,” he said. “They should be worried about Captain Flip Flop and his band of socialists.”
They will both be wary of a repeat of 1970, when then Labour prime minister, Harold Wilson, hoped to secure a third consecutive election victory.
Before calling the vote Wilson had discussed the potential for a football-inflicted national mood swing with his advisers. Their fears came to life when England unexpectedly blew a 2-0 lead against West Germany just four days before polls opened.
Philip Cowley, professor of politics at Queen Mary University of London, said many in Wilson’s government sincerely blamed England’s exit for their electoral defeat. “The problem with that view is there are plenty of other things that could have caused a late swing against Labour. And there’s pretty good evidence the polls were just out,” he said.
Cowley added that it was important to “never overstate how obsessed people are by the election”. Instead, Cowley suggested the political impact in 2024 will be limited to keeping party activists at home when the home nations are playing – which would probably mean “three nights where you can’t go canvassing in Scotland, maybe four in England”.
