Measures taken to prevent.

After World War II, attendance at the top 4 divisions of football in England were around 40 million. In 1985 problems with hooliganism caused attendance to fall dramatically. There was a huge concern and and after English teams were excluded from European competition for 5 years they decided to make some changes.

The football authorities introduced membership-only areas in grounds and the football in the community scheme was started to build bridges between the clubs and their local communities and to promote better behaviour by spectators. However, the Government’s plan was to introduce a 100% identity card system for all football fans wanting to attend matches. This was in the process of being developed when the Hillsborough Stadium Disaster occurred in April 1989; the ensuing Taylor Report persuaded the Government to shelve its plans for an ID card scheme due to concerns raised in the report about possible safety issues arising at the stadium turnstiles. Coming so soon after the Bradford Fire and the Heysel Disaster, the Hillsborough Disaster and the recommendations made in the Taylor Report changed the face of football grounds in this country.

The Government has established a UK Football Policing Unit which is jointly overseen by the Home Office and the Association of Chief Police Officers. It brings together various strands of the football policing infrastructure, including the Football Banning Orders Authority, the former NCIS football intelligence section, UK National Football Information Point and the ACPO football policing support team. The UK Football Policing Unit specialises in the monitoring of football related disorder and the collation of intelligence to help prevent it. Police forces across the country have developed a great deal of expertise in dealing with footballrelated disorder. The Association of Chief Police Officers has produced a best practice document with guidance on the policing of football matches. There are training courses for police match commanders and for football intelligence officers and there is an annual conference of match commanders which helps further to share best practice. Representatives of the football authorities meet regularly with ACPO and attend the annual conference.