Speaking on `RadioTV Serie A with RDS`, Andrea Abodi, the Minister of Sport, discussed various topics: `40 years ago, I used to read the radio news on Radio Dimensione Suono, which shows how long the journey has been. I was the second voice with Mauro Mazza for the radio broadcasts of the championship, for one of the two Roman teams. I was perhaps the first second voice, and I demonstrated my sentimental inadequacy there because I got emotionally involved and in some cases had to stop broadcasting due to a goal from my team, perhaps the team that was being saved by that goal. It`s a beautiful story that remains in my heart, so it`s a great pleasure to be back here.`
ON THE TOPIC OF BETTING
`Sport teaches many things: being together, respecting each other, respecting oneself. We always try to promote this perspective. It is somewhat what the Constitution states, that educational, social, and well-being promotion value. This is on the condition that the protagonists also take responsibility for it. I am in default because a year and a half ago, in the face of events that were in some ways related, I proposed, to myself, the elaboration of a Charter of Duties because I believe that rights are very clear and reiterated and protected as well as represented by unions, while duties are a bit less so. I have not heard a word about the problem from the AIC (Italian Footballers` Association). We need to have a systematic approach to education, training, and information. These are problems that seem to disappear, thinking that when nothing emerges, everything is fine, but that`s not the case.`
ON THE TOPIC OF STADIUMS
`The interaction between the activities entrusted to a commissioner, moreover, in the hypothesis of a proposed rule that provides for sub-commissioning with mayors. We do not want to intervene heavy-handedly in local realities, but we want to provide simplified and accelerated tools and procedures that aim at the objective of fair competition, which also passes through the development of infrastructures that put everyone in the same conditions; then the difference is made by the players on the field. And also the initiative of the clubs, the determination with which infrastructural objectives are pursued. Football in Italy is determined by the championship, cups, and the market, with rare exceptions. The infrastructural issue is addressed, but in the face of the alibi of bureaucracy, people give up, because if you lose on Sunday, the stadium is not talked about during the week. I understand it in some ways, but we have made a qualitative leap. On one hand, the commissioner, the sports decree that I hope can be presented shortly also contains the configuration of the commissioner structure, with all that this entails in terms of powers that do not override but use the best commissioner practices to accelerate the process. This is to respond to a need that is that of 2032, which is anticipated to 2026 for the definition of the five Italian stadiums; UEFA has established these timelines. April-May 2027 for the opening of the various construction sites, time is not much. It is a competition, everyone must demonstrate that they really want to proceed.`
`We will go beyond the five cities; the main reason as far as I am concerned is systemic, to improve the infrastructural capital. All past experiences have allowed me not only to mature convictions but also to become a bit resistant to announcements, and now it is a matter of proceeding.`
`I am convinced that through the commissioner structures, also using the will of the clubs and administrations that in some cases have moved forward, and with the portfolio of current financial opportunities, we will be able to open, around the end of this year and next, another two construction sites in addition to the one in Florence, which is a partial construction site. Bologna and Cagliari are two other projects ready, as are Empoli and Parma. We are beginning to see a planning that is widening, which is not just a splendid example as happened in Turin, Udine, and Bergamo.`
`On the financial portfolio, we are configuring with the MEF (Ministry of Economy and Finance) a series of products ranging from the equity fund, to the real estate fund, to guarantees combined between Credito Sportivo SACE, to interest rate subsidies, another special fund entrusted to Credito Sportivo, to a negotiation on the European market of financial provision at facilitated conditions up to simplified procedures that will go inside the commissioner structure also for the possible alienation of the asset.`
ON SPORTS CENTERS AND THE USE OF TAX CREDITS
`They are part of the ingredients of a menu that we are trying to make available; I am pleased that President Simonelli is in tune with the thought I have always expressed. Sometimes club presidents ask for the things I am trying to do; it is a reciprocal stimulus. This government has had to address the issue of tax credits on other very impactful fronts that have left a mark and determined a certain reluctance. I am regaining negotiation spaces with the Ministry of Economy.`
`I believe that tax credits can serve for all sports infrastructures, especially for the investment part, therefore for the debt part and not for equity, for the youth sectors which then allow us to address more serenely the issue of young people who are taken away by a market that is sometimes not transparent. But also the issue of women`s football, which is a football that still needs to be accompanied not in the logic of perpetual subsidy but of transition that can determine financial self-sufficiency.`
`I want to work on these issues, and in the next budget law, I would like to try the experience also to demonstrate that there is a healthy way to use the instrument of tax credits. If we give a tax credit of a reasonable percentage, even a minority one, it is clear that the added value is determined by the realization of the work, in addition to the sporting added value. Training facilities are factories of the future; the more you invest in that, the more talent emerges and the more you achieve both sporting and financial, but also social results. I remain of the idea that football must propose opportunities that also have a social impact.`
`Sometimes the tax credit has also given a contribution in terms of transparency and emergence of operations that have not always been linear. I always remember that Italian sport is financed thanks to a 2019 rule proposed by Giancarlo Giorgetti with 32% of the fiscality of the sports system of the previous year with a guaranteed minimum. In the last two years, we have more than tripled the variable quota above 410 million, which means that the value chain depends on the ability to intercept opportunities and make them available to the entire system, not only the Serie A system, with all the benefit of Serie A but not only.`
ON SUSTAINABILITY
`There is an issue that should not be overlooked: the reputation of a system, credibility. It is the prerequisite for the development of any economy, especially one so visible. This must create responsibility because no one in the world of football operates with an end in itself. There is also an exemplary value, and the economic dimensions bring duties that must be felt.`
`Regarding the agency, it has gone through its path, which has not been simple; it was a matter of making a selection by qualifications with stringent criteria. We have reached a determination that has allowed us to elaborate the first implementation regulation, another issue not secondary, that of the rules of the new subject and the rules of interaction with other subjects.`
`After that, we have selected the names. There are three categories, three designations that come from the call for applications, which are examined, moreover, together with the two names that emerge from the designations of agreement of the two federations with the four professional leagues of the seventh commissions of the Chamber and Senate, moreover, with 2/3 of the vote. Added to these are the director of the revenue agency and the president of INPS (National Social Security Institute) to give a more systemic sense. We have made a qualitative leap for this instrument, which must not only evaluate the financial economic balance of the club according to the criteria elaborated by the federations, not only verify the correct fulfillments with respect to the obligations towards the members and therefore verify the absence of debts for registration in the championships, but also verify the control chain to try to give transparency to the properties. In addition, it must also make proposals trying to seize ideas that also come from the best European experiences, with the concept that everything is put in the hands of the federal councils in the perspective of respecting autonomies but also with the duty of the proposal that then puts everyone in front of their responsibilities so that the championships are fair, the rights of the members are protected, and the system can regain its credibility and reputation at all levels, which when an accident happens along the way are not guaranteed.`
ON THE OPERATIONALITY OF THE CONTROL AGENCY
`I have made the proposal; now there is a debate that precedes the vote of the parliamentary commissions; there could be small adjustments because what counts on the premise of the quality and independence of the people is that there is the necessary consensus because we must agree on these premises, and I hope that there is no disagreement on the names to prejudice the value of the instrument that we have implemented. Certainly for the next championship, after registration for the championship, therefore from July onwards, there will be a handover.`
CRIME AND FOOTBALL
`I am of the idea that the rules should first of all be known, respected, and applied. They should be evaluated and eventually improved where necessary. This presupposes a structural collaboration between all bodies. We meet every month with Minister Piantedosi, with the entire technical structure, also with the intelligence part, with the Chief of Police, with the federal president, with the presidents of the professional leagues, and also the Amateur League. Precisely because we want this relationship to allow us to intercept the problems. This relationship must be able to avoid finding ourselves in the embarrassment of being left alone; the State does not leave you alone, you must use all the levers that the State makes available.`
`We know about the infiltration of crime in stadiums or in football in a general sense. So we are talking about ultras, not the entire ultra groups, match-fixing and sports betting, services connected to football and the stadium. We are also talking about pirate platforms; that is criminal economy. From this point of view, I understand part of the communication policy of the League which says `Piracy kills football`. I believe that football is killed by many things; there is a risk that many things affect the health of football, but piracy is criminal economy. Whoever buys a match for even 10 euros on those channels is fueling arms and drug trafficking; one must be aware of this. The qualitative leap that we have made from a regulatory point of view, in addition to putting us in a position of international and European leadership, has raised the issue not only of those who offer the service but also of those who take that service. It is not a prank. There are those who do it because they think it is an anti-system demonstration, there are those who do it because they have no money and it suits them, there are those who do it out of snobbery. It is no coincidence that among the 5000 already identified, perhaps there is someone who already has a `role`. We are trying to intervene and it will be increasingly so so that not only those who offer it, who have a criminal attitude, but also those who buy it, must understand what they are doing.`
ON THE GAP WITH OTHER COUNTRIES
`We manage to achieve extraordinary results despite some shortcomings; this is due to the value of the athletes, the ability of the coaches and instructors and trainers. The support of families is important, the support of associations and companies affiliated with the federations; it is a supply chain. We win, but we do not convince everyone; sedentary lifestyle is still a widespread phenomenon, and it produces a significant economic and social cost. Getting up from the couch, even metaphorically, is not very simple.`
`This government, without taking anything away from those who worked before me, has a broader vision. It is trying to pursue objectives that are constitutional; it is the first time that the relationship between a constitutional norm and the implementation of the program is understood. If the Republic truly recognizes the educational, social, and psycho-physical well-being promotion value of sports activity in all its forms and manages to decline it, it is simply doing what every government and every citizen should do in the implementation of the Constitution. Even every single citizen can make their contribution.`
`We are putting in place, in an equilibrium that I think is healthier, the social component of sport with competitive sport where we win. But the distance that existed between the ability to win and that of not spreading the sporting message and its values is unbearable. Sport really is a social and individual immune defense. What we have done in Caivano, what we are doing with area projects concerning Rome, Milan, Naples, Foggia, Palermo, Reggio Calabria, and Catania. What we are doing with Minister Piantedosi with another level of integrated intervention with development and cohesion funds for less articulated but more widespread interventions in places of peripheral disadvantage. The 1250 playgrounds that we have built in a year and a half in the municipalities of the south with fewer than 10,000 inhabitants. `Sport and suburbs` was born in 2017, and we are giving it continuity. All this is integrated with the activity of the individual regions with which we collaborate in a structured way to relate the concurrent matter between the central government and that of the regions co-owners of the theme. Before we ignored each other, or even clashed, while now we compete in the good sense of the term.`
`The Youth Games are nothing more than the expression of this planning that becomes systemic within schools where there is still a significant distance compared to our idea; it is there that the sports offer is consecrated for everyone. We must improve the gyms; Minister Valditara has found resources for a figure double that of the PNRR (National Recovery and Resilience Plan) and is carrying out a territorial operation precisely starting from the south to try to reduce the distances. Together we are trying to find resources for the first three years of elementary school that do not do motor education with qualified personnel. We are trying to stabilize the fourth and fifth grades within the mandate. We are making resources available to Sport e Salute (Sport and Health) for a project called Scuola Attiva Kids and Junior (Active School Kids and Junior) which provides for the tutoring of teachers with qualified sports personnel. We are working with Minister Bernini to qualify the degree courses in motor sciences in a way more oriented towards psychomotricity, which are becoming unbalanced on the medical-scientific part.`
`The Youth Games are not done by me and Minister Valditara alone, but we collaborate with Minister Locatelli for the paralympic culture part, with Minister Schillaci for health, with Minister Fratin for the issue of the relationship with the environment, and with Minister Lollobrigida for the food part. Sports games that become a civic journey. Now Minister Giuli is added because the world of arts will be an ally of that of sport.`
`We study the numbers, we try to understand through an objective interpretation of both economic and social phenomena and well-being how we can orient investments to develop an Italian model that aims to continue to win but above all to combat those phenomena of degeneration that we notice when they become crime news.`
ON THE BOBSLEIGH TRACK
`Going down the bobsleigh track was wonderful. Initially, my motivation was to have followed everything from the moment of conception, but something was missing. That is, the demonstration that that creature, wonderful from a technical, infrastructural, and also technological point of view, was not only for a select few and that it could also be an opportunity for fun with all the necessary safety. Until they tell you about it, it`s one thing; people saw this thing as distant; the fact that a sixty-five-year-old did this thing that had its sixty seconds of palpitation is the demonstration that the track exists, that it is safe, that it can be used not only by great champions but also by normal people.`
`The life of these infrastructures also depends on the multiplicity of uses that are made of them. A miracle was done; no one believed it in a year. In China, it took them more than two years; this is to make sense of the undertaking. And it is also an environmentally compatible jewel; we are planting 8000 trees that will give further meaning to the structure; there was no talk of the cooling center, a world avant-garde, which will serve not only the track but also the ice palace of Cortina.`