Tractor-Boys.com

While viewing a rival forum today encountered a subject on their pages where it states we are (the club) suing Suffolk Police for what they view as unlawful expenses regards Police presence within vicinity of the stadium. It reads as such :

"Ipswich found they were being charged not just for Police inside Portman Road, but also in the streets near the ground on match days.

They announced this was unlawful charging and are suing the Police for £200,000. The local constabulary have countered by stating they have a Memorandum of Understanding which shows the club will pay for Policing outside the ground, but the cost per officer would be reduced. Be interesting to see how this pans out."

Having taken the time to view the Suffolk Police website itself, could find no mention of this despite putting forward relevant information in their search area to aid any potential findings.

Maybe sounds ignorant but not living in the vicinity and restricted to few and far home games, only wondered what the issue was here. The full article can be found on the Bristol City fan site One Team in Bristol on their main index page. (Was unable to provide a link to the relevant information)

The argument is and always will be, whose issue is crowd disorder in the street.

Now on any given day, when the club isn't operating a game, an issue arising in Portman Road would result in a member of the public calling 999 and an officer being deployed. The issue is that the police have always claimed that the additional footfall in the area is the clubs doing and therefore they should be liable for the additional cost to police it.

The stewards and security for the club have no more right than any other citizen when it comes to dealing with public crowd disorder. The policy will be to eject them from the ground and should it be for a criminal offence, pass it off to the police for arrest and detainment.

All that is different is the club have a direct line to the local bobbies, other than that its a case of calling and waiting. If fans decide to start brawling in the town, as has been seen during the euros, it's not necessarily the clubs issue