Is mór an onóir dom labhairt leis an gCathaoirleach, leis na Seanadóirí agus leis na daoine uaisle eile mar uachtarán Chumann Lúthchleas Gael inniu. Gabhaim buíochas ó chroí le Cathaoirleach an tSeanaid, an Seanadóir Buttimer, as ucht an chuiridh. It is a huge privilege to be addressing Seanad Éireann as uachtarán Chumann Lúthchleas Gael. Never in my wildest imagination did I think I would follow in the footsteps of my maternal great-granduncle, Domhnall Ua Buachalla, and address a House of the Oireachtas. As a Teachta Dála for North Kildare, he sat in the First Dáil and attended the Dáil in this building when he was elected for the Kildare constituency in 1927. He subsequently became Governor-General of Ireland.
Allow me to acknowledge, as an Cathaoirleach has, the presence of my wife Barbara and our two sons, Conor and Shane, who both flew in from America this morning to be here. My six sisters are here, as is the ard stiúrthóir, Mr. Tom Ryan, Mr. Alan Milton and Mr. Cian Murphy from Croke Park. Mr. Ger Ryan is here from the Munster Council, as is Pádraig Ó Céidigh, who is chair of our audit and risk committee. I thank them for their attendance.
One of the objectives Cumann Lúthchleas Gael had post-Covid was that we would return to 2019 levels of activity and achievement. We have surpassed that milestone. The annual reporting accounts to the association published at congress in February attest to a very successful 2022. Early indications for 2023 are pointing in a very positive direction. Allianz league attendances are up 11%. The inter-county championships, which started two weekends ago - maybe in New York - have been invigorating and robust attendances are very encouraging. As Members will know, the inter-county competition will continue until the end of July and once completed, the inter-club competitions will begin in earnest.
The club season is a most invigorating time of the year and puts the spotlight firmly on the more than 1,600 clubs that we have dotted around the island of Ireland. These are managed and organised by our volunteers, who are the backbone of our association. However, it is a growing challenge for us to recruit volunteers who have the time but, more importantly, the verve and energy to grow those clubs.
The administrative burden placed on us and the significant amount of time needed to address statutory and non-statutory requirements is onerous. Statutory obligations such as child safety and anti-money laundering requirements are welcome as they make us a better organisation, but I would ask Sport Ireland and the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media in particular to take cognisance of the fact that we are operating in a society in which time poverty is rampant. A reduction in demand on volunteers is no guarantee of increased volunteerism. However, an increasing burden of demands will exacerbate what is for us, a very challenging situation.
One area where we have managed to reduce the burden is by reducing use of cash at our grounds. This has removed the responsibility of handling large amounts of cash taken at stiles and ticket points of sale. It has been highly effective in removing stress from our volunteers. We will continue to pursue this policy. It is not perfect, particularly for those who may not be familiar with cashless procedures or may not be technologically proficient. However, the number of people presenting at our matches who are unable to use the cashless system at our grounds is small. At a recent National Hurling League game, from an attendance of 10,600, just 18 people sought and were given access to the game without using the cashless system. The vast majority of our games are played within 3 km of a Centra or SuperValu shop where tickets can be purchased for cash or credit up to throw-in time. There are more than 340 retail shops selling tickets to our matches where patrons can pay by cash if they wish. We have instructed all county committees to ensure that nobody is prevented from attending a game as a result of not being familiar with the advanced ticket sales system. I have attended numerous club matches and the vast majority of spectators come with their tickets pre-purchased. In Louth, for example, spectators who are not familiar with the cashless system are directed to a particular steward who will assist them in gaining entry to the match. The Cork county committee is also ensuring that everybody who wishes to attend a Cork county board game can do so. We are very aware of all our obligations to all sectors of society. Charges that we are excluding any sector are without basis. Our imperative is to facilitate and promote greater attendance at games from every sector of the community and our ticketing policy derives from that objective. The message that all county committees has been given is that nobody is to be turned away and that everybody who wishes to go to a match must be facilitated.
The five-year strategic plan of the GAA, Aontas 2026 - Towards One GAA for All, has many ambitious targets, including the integration of three great cultural and sporting organisations: Cumann Lúthchleas Gael, An Cumann Camógaíochta agus Cumann Peil Gael na mBan. The rationale for the strategy is equality, plain and simple. Led by the former President, Mary McAleese, the conversations with many layers of each organisation are ongoing. The questions being asked include how we are going to create one GAA for all and one association with equality at its core. The discussions are focused not on the "why" or the "if" but on the "how". The challenges that have been identified are many and varied. They include insurance, membership fees, administration, financial obligations and club catchment areas. However, the biggest challenge we will have is with facilities. Regardless of whether we are three associations or one, there is a finite number of facilities available. When we eventually integrate, the number is not going to increase magically without significant investment. GAA clubs have been the principal provider of facilities among the three associations. While we have been happy to do so, as one association it will be extremely difficult to meet the projected need.
While the sport infrastructure grants which come from the Department are very much appreciated and well received, I suggest that they will need to be increased significantly if we are serious about the concept of equality because pitches and the ability to provide opportunities to play all three of our games are key to integration. The GAA will invest over €3.5 million in club development grants in the current financial year. With an eye to integration, our central finance committee has decided that priority investment will be given to pitch development and to dressing rooms that are suitable for more than one gender. Pitches and green spaces are also key to our health and well-being as a society. Green spaces and sports facilities are often described as the lungs that our communities, particularly urban ones, use to breathe. Without them, one can see how a community might feel starved of that oxygen, not just in a physical sense, but in a community sense as well. We would not like to think of Ballymun without Setanta hurling club, Shantalla without St. Michael's or Blackpool without Glen Rovers. We are facing a continuous challenge of providing pitches for urban clubs. This challenge will grow exponentially once we integrate. We need the collective will and co-operation of planners, local authorities, politicians and sport organisations to ensure our communities are provided with the green space necessary for them to be able to play. The House can be assured that any public investment in facilities for any of our three associations will be returned in spades as we are collectively the best community-based sports organisations in the world. As uachtarán, I have no hesitation in saying that the return on investment for each of our associations will far exceed expectations.
The largest sports dome in the world is located at the Connacht centre of excellence in Ballyhaunis. It is a magnificent facility and a wonderful addition to the list of facilities that we have provided to our communities. It is in continuous use and allows for games to be played in all sorts of weather. From 1 September 2022 to yesterday, 25 April 2023, some 104,000 people have used the dome in one capacity or another. It only cost €3.2 million to construct and the majority of the funding came from the Connacht Council. There was a public contribution to the cost but even if there had not been, a back-of-the-envelope calculation on the basis of recent use will certainly support the contention that the return on investment is very significant. The potential benefit of indoor facilities with a usage rate similar to that in Ballyhaunis suggests we should research locations in other provinces that would be within a maximum 90-minute drive, and preferably within a one-hour drive, of the majority of our clubs. Publicly funded domes are worthy of analysis as a partial solution to the challenge of facilities in one association. That challenge cannot be overcome in isolation by the three associations. Public infrastructure investment will be needed.
While the challenges are numerous and varied, Senators can rest assured that the three Gaelic games associations are intent on meeting them and ultimately integrating. A small number of unacceptable disciplinary incidents have been identified in recent months. One such incident is one too many. While the incidents received quite a lot of publicity, the response to them has not been so widely reported. I am referring to a recent incident at a minor hurling game between two clubs in Dublin. Within three days of the match, the Dublin county board dealt with the referee's report, suspensions were given to a number of people involved and both clubs were fined. The well-publicised racism incident involving a Wexford hurler was dealt with by the central competitions control committee, CCCC. Having been identified, the person involved was requested to attend a CCCC meeting, where he admitted to the incident and expressed his sincere regret at what he had done. He explained that he had contacted the Wexford player, Lee Chin, and apologised to him. He also apologised to the Wexford and Tipperary county committees. While the CCCC appreciated his apologies, it considered that the incident was unacceptable and a suspension was proposed. The suspension came under a rule which we brought into effect this year to deal with incidents of racism. The rule contains a mitigation clause which allows a suspended person to undertake an anti-racism course and have the suspension reduced. The rationale for the mitigation is that the person would benefit from such a course and would learn in a positive way from their poor behaviour.
A number of changes which have tightened up rules and made punishments for various offences stiffer were passed by the GAA congress. The appeals process was strengthened. It is interesting to note that of the 104 disciplinary penalties issued in the first quarter, only two were successfully appealed. I suggest that this illustrates an enhanced robustness to our disciplinary system and also the high proportion of those who are beginning to accept the proposed penalties. We launched our "respect the referee" campaign last autumn. The aim of the campaign was to elevate respect for referees and match officials throughout the association. This campaign will continue over the next few months and it will be particularly relevant in September and October because history tells us that those two months are likely to be the most challenging. That is when club matches begin to grow in importance, tensions rise and people become more animated. It is the time when we need to be most vigilant to ensure we avoid the incidents that besmirched the reputation of the association last autumn. While national publicity campaigns are appropriate, it is at the individual and club levels that we need to deliver the message that any form of disrespect to referees is unacceptable. That should begin with the individual but is also important for the mentors of under age players to show respect for officials.
Children model their behaviour on adults and if our mentors model poor behaviour, our children will model the same disrespect towards officials. The cultural challenge of disrespect to referees needs a suite of responses, such as rule changes, publicity campaigns and notifications of our response to incidents. We have successfully put a number of those responses in place and will continue to work so officials and referees are given the respect they deserve.
“Fun is good” is the mantra of a baseball owner called Mike Veeck. It is a mantra that sports organisations might consider adopting as they seek to ensure that children continue to play their games. Making sure that every child enjoys themselves could be an organisation's greatest marketing tool. It is a narrative that emanates consistently from the Limerick hurling team: they have a good time together, they enjoy each other's company and they enjoy working together to achieve their objectives. If the all-Ireland champions can revel in fun, why can the rest of the association not do so? Given the GAA is an amateur, volunteer-led association, fun and enjoyment, in whatever guise it comes, should be obtained by adults in the association as much as by anybody else.
Lack of playing time and, by extension, a lack of fun was a complaint most often received by children's officers in 30 of the 32 counties last autumn. That suggests we have an underlying issue. When our children's participation programme, Go Games, was launched several years ago, it was rightfully lauded for its philosophy of inclusion and encouragement, giving game time to all participants and making sure that all children had fun. We appear to have allowed competitive Go Games tournaments to become acceptable. With a misplaced emphasis on winning, they are totally anathema to the philosophy of Go Games, are damaging to children and can deter involvement in the association. The founding philosophy of our Go Games will be revitalised as we need to show that fun is good and available to everybody, not just the elite.
While the majority of our clubs are on the island of Ireland, as the Cathaoirleach has suggested, we also have 450 clubs scattered around the world. They are an expansive global network of people who are interested in playing Gaelic games. Cities such as London, Chicago, New York and Sydney, where the Irish traditionally emigrated, form the backbone of this network, but the global GAA has grown to the extent that there are 14 administrative units around the world. Seven of them are based in counties of Britain while the others include the Middle East, Asia, Canada, Australasia, Europe, North America and New York. Each has its own structure and competitions which suit its membership, and there will be a gathering of this global GAA family in Derry in July, when the fourth world games are held between the 24th and the 28th. More than 4,000 people are expected to attend and, aside from the areas mentioned, we will also have teams entering from Argentina, South Africa and Mexico in camogie. Beidh fáilte rompu go léir go Doire ag an am sin.
The extent of this GAA network was recognised by the global Irish civic forum organised by the Department of Foreign Affairs last week in Dublin Castle. Speaker after speaker, including the Tánaiste, Deputy Micheál Martin, and the Minister of State, Deputy Sean Fleming, alluded to the influence of GAA clubs in their communities around the world. They continuously pointed out the support and assistance that the clubs give to all people in their communities. While games are at the heart of the GAA, thousands of people benefit, for example, from involvement in London GAA since it was founded 127 years ago. While the nature of emigration has changed over the years, the need for that connection and for support remains the same, and the GAA continues to provide that to its clubs.
Members might allow me to highlight the Middle East GAA, which recently organised its Middle Eastern championships in Abu Dhabi. At 6 p.m. on Friday, 10 March, they began their junior and senior hurling and camogie championships. At 12.40 a.m. on Saturday morning, on schedule, they threw in the ball for the final of the senior hurling competition. Seven hours later, at 8 a.m., the junior, intermediate and senior men's and women's football competitions began, and 147 games later, five minutes ahead of schedule, the ball was thrown in for the final of the women's senior championship. It was a tremendously successful tournament, all organised by the local volunteer committee.
Some of the countries around the world are identified as sports-mad and embrace sports participation, not so countries in the Middle East, where sport is not enthusiastically embraced and minority sports such as Gaelic games are not understood. It is relatively easy to grow and develop Gaelic games in Ireland as it is an environment where they are the dominant sports. It is significantly more difficult to develop Gaelic games in a culture where they are very much the minority sports, and such is the challenge for GAA clubs around the world. There is a long-time realisation that the growth and development of Gaelic games is not sustainable through emigration alone and that their growth cannot be confined to providing games only to adults. Through a number of initiatives in various parts of the world, children are being given the opportunity and the seeds of a lifetime commitment to the GAA are being sewn. Thousands of young people play matches and events, such as the Continental Youth Championships, CYC, in North America and the all-British championships in Britain. Numerous foreign-based children's teams travel to Ireland to compete in the annual Féile or under-15 hurling and football competitions. These include teams from Australia, US GAA, New York and the winners of the European Féile competition, which was held in Berlin last year and was won by a team from Brussels. Aside from these competitions, cities with larger GAA infrastructure, such as New York and London, have local leagues and competitions.
Typically, the growth and development of Gaelic games is the remit of clubs and volunteers. Getting GAA activities on the curriculum of local education authorities has been achieved in Galicia and is an ongoing project in Australia. GAA representatives are constantly providing curriculum material to physical education teachers in Australia and have found a very receptive audience in a number of states. Galicia is an interesting case study in that the Celtic connection between the region and Ireland has spawned an interest in Gaelic games. Galicia participates in European competitions and has been represented at the world games. As part of the second level physical education curriculum in the region, over 4,000 Galician children received a six-week course in Gaelic games in 2022. As a result, they competed in local tournaments and competed in the European Féile competition in Berlin. We will continue to engage with local education authorities to grow and develop our games outside of Ireland and outside of the expat and second and third-generation markets. It will undoubtedly be a long, slow process but it is certainly worth continuing.
One of the challenges of playing Gaelic games outside of Ireland is distance. It is not uncommon for players in the US to drive seven or eight hours for a match or in Asia to fly to a tournament. Long train rides across the regions of Europe to play are a norm. This brings a substantial cost to people’s participation and the cost burden is significantly increased when a family is participating. The cost of travelling from the west coast of the US to the east coast for the CYC is considerable but given their commitment to Gaelic games, it is a cost that many parents are willing to bear. It is a commitment that we should be aware of, appreciate and never underestimate.
There is, to use the words of US sports commentator, Bob Costas, “a corrosive assault on civility” taking place in relation to sport and sportspeople through the medium of social media, and maybe through mainstream media as well, but less so, I suggest. It should be realised that what one says matters, what one writes matters, what one puts in the public domain matters. By all means, let people express an opinion, but let it be done in a manner that is respectful.
