| Description | The Trusts channel money from the Pools Promoters Association's Spotting the Ball competition into football. The FGIT was set up during the passage through Parliament of the Safety of Grounds Act, 1975, with the primary aim of making grants to Football League Clubs for safety work at their grounds. A secondary purpose was the betterment of facilities generally. A growing sense of the problems facing football in the late 1970s encouraged the PPA to set aside more money from the Spotting the Ball Competition for wider objectives and at the end of 1979 a new Football Trust was established. 60 percent of its funds were allocated to the FGIT to continue its work and other areas identified for Football Trust support, for example crowd control and non-league and grassroots football. Thompson who was appointed a Trustee in January 1980 was particularly interested in crowd control problems. |