There’s no other way of saying it: we lost at Congress last Saturday. To put it any differently is to just fool ourselves. And we were never in that business.Congress was hugely disappointing for us and for the view of the GAA that we had. Some of the main thoughts/reactions to it are:

• We lost but don’t know by how much. One paper said we had about three dozen supporters … another said maybe 40% of the vote went for us. On Friday night we had asked for the vote to be counted and were told it would be. On Saturday that agreement was reneged on. That’s sad. But who knows, it could work out like the GPO in 1916 … as the years go on and the consequences become apparent, more-and-more people will say: “I was there and I did my bit”!!!

• For the record the Counties that stood against the grants/expenses/whatever were: Antrim; Armagh; Derry; Donegal; Down; Fermanagh; Limerick; Longford; Louth; and Tyrone.

• If we had one vote for every person who met us over the two days and said “I have grave reservations about this, but …” well, the result would have been very different!

• Just before the vote was taken Paraic Duffy spoke at some length in favour of the motion. That’s not on and it shouldn’t have happened. It was an appalling call in terms of where executive, paid staff sit within the governance of an organisation that’s based on members and their elected representatives. At that moment Paraic ceased to be Ard-Stiúrthóir for any GAA member who was against the motion. And that’s intolerable.

• Derry’s Seamus Mc Cloy shone as a County Chairman who had the courage to stand up and state his and his County’s case. Bellaghy and Derry were never found wanting before. Neither were they at Congress! From all of us Seamus: Thank You!
• After the vote we mistakenly believed Donegal abstained on the vote. That was our inexcusable mistake. We can only apologise for it. But it shouldn’t have happened and we did Donegal a disservice. It’s the one thing in all of this we’re not proud of.

DRA Business

Well the DRA hearing finally happened, three months and three weeks after we went there.

Again, let’s not fool ourselves: we lost. The DRA didn’t accept our analysis. The DRA Tribunal’s report on our hearing is available in full on www.sportsdra.ie (look under Decisions) but among the nuggets in the findings are the following:

(Paragaraph 1): “Their status as members has never been in question; the contribution of their witnesses alone to the Association over many years, both as players and administrators, is most impressive; and, quite properly, their standing to bring these arbitration proceedings has not been challenged. As such, suggestions that have been made publicly (although not by those involved in this arbitration) to the effect that the Claimants are in some way ‘external’ to the Association, are both incorrect and unfair”.

A few leading GAA people and one or two journalists should read this.

Paragraph 44: “It would seem sensible, both in the context of Rule 11 and any enhanced expenses scheme such as that under consideration here, to fix not only rates of expenses but types of expenses allowable, because while certain heads of expenditure might happily fall within any man’s view of ‘expenses’ others might extend into what might justifiably be ‘reward’. “

Yes, we though that too. In fact it’s at the core of this whole mess. But confusion and mess it remains. Even after Saturday’s vote nobody has a clue as to what’s eligible and what isn’t. But the blank cheque has now been signed.

Paragraph 54: “Central Council argue that if the enhanced meal or mileage rate exceeded what was properly treated as an expense, the Revenue Commissioners would be entitled to tax it and no sums were payable that fell into that bracket: accordingly there is a safeguard against breaches of Rule 11.”

This means there’s no €1.27-a-mile rate for players in the six counties where anything above €0.60-a-mile is taxable. This part of the scheme delivers us a partitionist GAA. Now that is unacceptable … but it’s a reality.

Paragraph 54: “That does not, in our opinion, answer the question why a (well-off) club should remain prohibited from paying its members Civil Service mileage rates (since, by Central Council’s definition, those rates constitute expenses and not reward), while inter-county players would be free to collect them”.

Yes, we wondered about that too. One rule for one … another rule for another! And certain conflict down the line.

Paragraph 61: “The Schemes may be a very good idea, and they may be a very bad one”.

Well, we’ll let you make your choice on that one!

Paragraph 63: “Although unsuccessful in the result, it is clear from the two sets of arbitration proceedings that the Claimants cannot be said to have failed in their endeavours”.

It was gratifying to hear this. But we’re not foolish nor naïve. We didn’t get the result at the DRA we wanted. The outcome is the GAA adopting a scheme that we believe, in the DRA’s own words, will be “a very bad one.” That means we failed.

We can’t close on the DRA without putting on record our appreciation of how Drumquin and Tyrone’s Paddy Fahy led the line for us at the hearing. A tour-de-force from someone who was never afraid to face the odds for things that were right.

So That’s It

We came together to try to stop this move towards pay-for-play in the GAA. Hopefully it’s not self-praise to say we made a decent effort at it. Everybody knows that those promoting the grants had to retreat hastily and embarrassingly from their 8 December position. We didn’t have to retreat from ours.

We tried hard and got great support from you all. But it wasn’t to be.

Anyway, life goes on. We hope it will be good for you and yours. But “Of One Belief” won’t be part of it. We now leave the stage!

Thank you all for your help and support. It was great being associated with you.

Go gcuire Dia rath agus bláth oraibh uilig.

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