Spain's Football League Moves to Stop Strike
RICHARD QUEST, HOST: Off the lows of the day, but the Dow is still down most -- almost half a percentage point. HTP ringing the closing bell. Time to hit the gavel.</s>QUEST: Oh! That's what you call a good, strong gaveler on Monday, the 11th of May. Tonight, it's a more level playing field literally. A footballer strike in Spain is drawing anger from La Liga. A lot of talking, not a lot of progress. I'll ask the EU Commission vice president what's gone wrong with the Greece talks. And a surreal amount of cash. This painting is about to make history. But would you want it on your wall? I'm Richard Quest. We start a new week together, and I mean business. Good evening. We begin tonight with Spain's football league vowing to stop a strike that could wreck the final matches of La Liga's season. In a power struggle over TV rights, the biggest football stars in Spain are up against the league officials. Now, the players are threatening a strike that, if it takes place, could cost more than 50 million euros a day. Join me at the super screen and we'll talk more about it and you'll see. This is, of course, a strike that you might wonder what on Earth is it all about? Well, the dispute is over plans to negotiate media deals collectively instead of club by club. La Liga, that's the league, they want to create a more level playing field and to do so by pooling TV revenues. The idea is smaller clubs have a chance to take home more money. The Spanish government supports the changes, and they want to stop the strike. And the Spanish government has put in place a law that would allow for this collective bargaining, or collective negotiation. The professional league says a strike would be illegal, and they've filed a suit to stop the strike.</s>JAVIER TEBAS, PRESIDENT, SPANISH PROFESSIONAL LEAGUE (through translator): It is an a la carte strike. For this yes, for this no, I want this. So what does it mean? That it's a strike to hurt La Liga, and those kinds of strikes are forbidden. They're only aiming to hurt the league and teams who are complaining.</s>QUEST: Blow the whistle, because you've got the stop strike on the one side, but on the other side is the Football Federation, which is supporting the strike. It says the changes don't guarantee enough money for the smaller clubs. Wealthy superstars like Messi and Xavi are supporting a protest by the players' union. The head of the union said they will strike because the older system is fairer.</s>LUIS RUBIALES, HEAD OF SPANISH FOOTBALL PLAYERS' UNION (through translator): Do you think these football players here today have any need to get into this situation? They are here because in the FAE captains' meeting, we agreed that whatever change we achieve would be in favor of the humblest for the sake of the division and equally for them.</s>QUEST: Esteve Calzada joins me now from London. He's a former marketing director for FC Barcelona. Good grief! This is complicated as to who is -- who wants a strike, who doesn't want a strike. And now the whole thing is going into the courts. Let me ask you, what is so wrong with this new collective bargaining arrangement?</s>ESTEVE CALZADA, FORMER MARKETING DIRECTOR, FC BARCELONA: It is complicated, but actually, you guys gave a very good explanation of what's going on. I think no one is questioning the fact that Spanish La Liga needs a centralized system that distributes the money in a more equal way. It just has to do with the way this money is distributed. One of the things that the footballers' union is asking for is for more money to go to lower divisions. The way it is now, it's 90 percent for La Liga clubs and then 10 percent for Segunda Liga clubs. They are trying to get this percentage for Segunda Liga and below that higher.</s>QUEST: Right.</s>CALZADA: And that's why they are pushing for these changes, right? But I think it's important to put this in context. This is an historical moment for Spanish football, and all the parties realize that whatever they have to achieve, it's now or never. That's why everyone is trying to push to get the right portion.</s>QUEST: Right, but it's unusual to have the players saying that they are going to strike. And if the players do decide to forward this strike, what are the implications just two weeks before the end of the season?</s>CALZADA: Of course, the implications are huge, and it's a big damage for Spanish football. I want to think that this is going to be solved. It's happened in the past several times and normally gets solved. It doesn't help, again, the image of Spanish football. But I want to be optimistic and think that that situation will be resolved. Because at the end of the day, we still hurt the players themselves.</s>QUEST: Now, I -- I'm aware that, obviously, the players at the top of the game are getting many hundreds of thousands per match and millions a year. But it's a bit difficult to find too much sympathy for well-paid football players threatening to go on strike, isn't it?</s>CALZADA: Yes, exactly. And I would guess that some of them showing in that picture don't really know what it's about, and they just basically follow the instructions that they receive from the union, and they only know that they are trying to help the players with lower income. But again, I would be very surprised if this strike ends up being a concern. But let's see. Let's see, as of now, as La Liga president has said, obviously, the strike is (inaudible), and let's see what happens.</s>QUEST: Sir, thank you for joining us, putting it into context. We'll watch it closely. Thank you. The European markets mostly ended lower. It was concerns about Greece's debt, which we'll be talking about in just a moment. They were the troubles which weighed on investors, and this is despite reports saying that Greece is to make a payment to the IMF on Tuesday. Airbus shares were dropped -- were down 2 percent after that crash in Spain, which has raised questions about the future of the A400M, the military plane. So, you look down, you've got three markets that were down, one market, Zurich, the SMI, that was up And of course, in New York, the Dow Jones Industrials, that closed the day -- we'll talk more about the Dow later, but it did close the day down the best part of just over 80-odd points. Ministers meeting in Brussels have heard that Greece is paying an $800 million bill to the IMF. We'll talk about that after the break.