EPL clubs "have been accused of 'unfair and exploitative' practices after advertising for young interns to work as highly qualified performance analysts without pay or expenses for 12 months on the website of a government quango," according to Gibson & Walker of the London GUARDIAN. Football clubs including Reading, Wigan and Swansea "have all advertised for interns to work unpaid for an entire season to film training and matches, input data and analyse the performance of individual players." The "adverts appeared on the website of UK Sport," the quango that will receive £500M ($767M) in exchequer and lottery funding over the next four years to fund elite Olympic sport. UK Sport said that "it would meet next week with campaign group Intern Aware to discuss the issue." Intern Aware co-Founder Gus Baker said, "It's not about the amount of money in the company, it's about the culture and if there's a demand for young people to break in then it makes it worse. Sport is a good example. Companies are thinking 'why bother paying someone if you can get someone for free.' It's not only exploitative but it's exclusive." It was Intern Aware that "prompted the junior employment minister, Jo Swinson, to hand the names of 100 companies" -- which have not been made public but believed to include several household names -- to U.K. tax authority HMRC for investigation (GUARDIAN, 4/12).
