Minister says discussions on restart under way but warns against rush to resume

Culture secretary Oliver Dowden has insisted sports such as racing are right to be preparing for the resumption of competition but added that action can only be cleared to go ahead if it is in line with the wider health messages being given to the British public.

The resumption of racing workstream, which met most recently on Wednesday, has been drawing up proposals for the return of the sport, while discussions have been taking place between officials at the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) and organisations such as the police, Public Health England and local government associations.

Such measures are designed to place sport in the best possible position to "resume as quickly as possible", according to Dowden, although he cautioned against rushing to restart before overall health considerations have been factored in.

Oliver Dowden

Speaking at a DCMS select committee on Wednesday, Dowden said: "I personally have spoken to the Premier League and officials in my department are engaging across all of the sports. We've actually had quite productive discussions and have engaged with the police, Public Health England, LGAs and others.

"We're progressing this and I want to get to a point where we have bottomed out how this would work in practice and then, if the wider circumstances permit, we would seek permission through Cobra and others to do it. That is not what we're talking about now, but I want to make sure we do all the preparatory work.

"We would not expect sporting bodies to act in a way that was not consistent with wider public health guidance that was issued."

Last week, foreign secretary Dominic Raab outlined five tests the United Kingdom would need to pass for lockdown restrictions to be eased. These were: making sure the NHS can cope, a sustained and consistent fall in the death rate, for the infection rate to be dropping to manageable levels, ensuring personal protective equipment and Covid-19 tests can meet future demand and that any adjustments would not trigger a second wave of infections.

In response to a question from Philip Davies MP about any additional tests sport would need to satisfy to return behind closed doors, Dowden said: "There's the safety of participants to consider. If you took, for example, football and, probably horseracing, it would be quite difficult to have the participants acting in a socially distant way.

"So how would we resolve the social distancing part of it? It's not insurmountable but how would we resolve it? So that's an extra consideration."

On Sunday, Nick Rust, BHA chief executive, said racing was on a "knife-edge" in terms of balancing getting the sport going again and keeping the public and government onside.

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