Hugh Robertson hoping clubs will support drive against discrimination.
UK Minister for Sport Hugh Robertson has provided his support for the ‘Football vs Homophobia’ campaign according to BBC Sport.
The initiative was launched by the FA in February and has the dual aims of trying to eradicate homophobia from the game whilst attempting to make the football environment more welcoming to people who identify themselves as gay, lesbian, bi-sexual and trans-gender.
The FA have provided a toolkit to clubs as part of the initiative which offers advice on how to promote anti-homophobia stances on in the crowd on match-days through the use of tannoy announcements and articles within match-day programmes.
Eight Premier League clubs have already signed up to the initiative and Robertson is hopeful the remainder will join up in due course.
Campaigners are hoping that 50% of all England’s current professional teams will join the initiative by the end of March.
‘The toolkit from the FA is a good initiative and I urge more clubs to use it’, said Robetson.
‘Discrimination of any kind must be stamped out. I want to see the football authorities increase their efforts to tackle homophobia.’
The campaign has taken over from the previous Justin Campaign as it looks to offer a broader agenda against homophobia rather than focusing on former Norwich striker Justin Fashanu.
Fashanu is the only professional footballer in England to have ever come out publically as gay but tragically went on to commit suicide in 1998.