The Gaelic Player’s Association today moved to protect the player’s grants amid fears the scheme could be scrapped by the Government at next week’s emergency budget.
In the region of 1,800 senior intercounty players received payments of between €1,400 to €2,500 at the tail end of last year – costing the Government some €3.5 million – after a lengthy campaign by the GPA.
However, given the likely cuts to be made across the board in the budget, those awards could be both the first and last made to GAA players.
Addressing TDs and Senators at a briefing this afternoon, GPA chief executive Dessie Farrell insisted that his body would resist any move to scrap the scheme. While Farrell conceded that a cut to the current funding was likely, he maintained it would be completely unfair to abolish the awards in their entirety.
“We are on the record, since the onset of the current economic crisis, as saying that we are prepared to take a cut to this funding,” Farrell said today. “And we will accept a reduction so long as it is in line with the other sports.
“What we will not accept is the elimination of the scheme to support other sports as we believe in contravenes the 2007 Agreement. The principle of this Agreement was that the State would treat intercounty GAA players as they do other Irish sports practitioners.”