A board makes decision by majority vote, and it’s not unusual with employee board representatives.
Some background, don’t know if they exist in England:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worker_representation_on_corporate_boards_of_directors
So it’s not the oddest idea from my POV. Do I think it would impact things? Nah. Clearly any owner would control the majority. And I mean SAF is on the board right now (I think).
To have a real impact, you must be able to impact the owner. Most issues are money issues.
they are not employees though?
a BoD exists to serve the best interests of the company and it's shareholders, so a board that exists only to serve the owner is pretty dysfunctional and not operating correctly
if, as was suggested, the fan is given the seat only to eventually just dismiss their views, that means the rest of the board are basically just proxies to agree with the owner
that is why you need a broad range of inputs, one or two finance people, a marketing person, one from ops etc.. as well as some NEDs to get some outside perspective/experience away from the cliques within the company.. that way decisions are discussed and debated in an efficient manner and good decisions are made
having one fan on there would disrupt the balance completely... you'd honestly have to be a total idiot to agree to this (as an owner)