The People's Club

A sugar daddy is not necessarily the best thing. I for one do not wish to see the club I support the plaything of some decadent billionaire. Forgive me if I sound a wee bit lefty here, but then again perhaps we could look at a solution which makes the People's Club ring true.

I would like to offer a plan for Everton FC. Let's call it the Barcelona Plan. Barcelona Football Club has 150,000 members - not shareholders - who each pay about £140 per year. The members vote for their president every four years.

This means that each year the club receives something in the region of £21,000,000 per year from its members. This is above and beyond other income. Now not all these members can fit in the Nou Camp at one time - it only has capacity for 98,000. So at least one third of the members give presumably because they want to belong.

Let's translate that to our own club. Let's say a capacity of around 40,000 - I know it isn't that, but we'll work with round numbers - with about 60,000 members, each paying £150 a year. That's £9,000,000 a year. Every year.

These are hard times, I grant you, and not everyone will want or be able to pay that in one go, but £150 a year is a little less than £3 per week. A couple of Sunday papers and the Football Echo.

Shares in Everton - or Liverpool - are available but pay no dividend. So, in effect, shareholders own their shares for reasons other than profit. The shares are sold privately and the price is agreed between buyer and seller - no public quotes. There are about 35,000 shares out there, commanding prices upwards of £1,000 per share. So it would take anything from £35,000,000 to buy the club for the members of the Barcelona Plan. That's closer to £750 per member for 60,000 members. So something would need to be worked out.

Frankly, it is difficult to see anything but good for this plan. It would give the club to the people who pay a large portion of their income to see and support the team. It follows that it would bring the sport itself back to us. It would generate a reliable income so we do not have to kow tow to Sky - at least not quite so much. And it would make true the slogan 'The People's Club.'

At Everton we pride ourselves on being the first in so many ways. Why not be the first in a way that would change football in this country forever. It has worked quite well for Barcelona.