Killoe’s Leinster appeal against 48-week ban faces logistical challenge
LEINSTER Council is facing a logistical problem as its hearings committee seeks to meet to hear Killoe Emmet Óg’s case challenging a 48-week ban for non-payment of a fine earlier this week.
The Longford champions had a bye from senior football championship action this weekend anyway but were due out next weekend in a third-round match against Mostrim.
If they are to be reinstated by Leinster or have the case sent back for rehearing, an outcome would have to be established by Thursday of next week at the latest to allow for 72 hours for a fixture. Otherwise, Longford would be pushing back the dates of their championship.
Leinster Council is understood to be keen for a hearing to take place ‘in person’, rather than written submissions or a virtual meeting because of the gravity of the case.
The regular venue for such hearings, the province’s headquarters in Portlaoise, is out of bounds because of the public health restrictions placed on Laois, Offaly and Kildare.
Some of Leinster’s hearings committee, including its current chairman and the province’s former chief executive Michael Delaney, are based within those three counties and are prohibited from moving outside that area because of current restrictions.
Consequently, Leinster are looking into co-opting new members on to a hearings committee to overcome these issues, but to do that may require permission from Croke Park.
The weight of the ban imposed on Killoe has shocked many inside and outside the county.
In January, Killoe informed the county board that their U-16 team would not be presenting to play a county final against St Colmcille’s/ St Francis as the outcome of a related investigation was still pending.
Longford’s Competition Controls
Committee awarded the game to St Colmcille’s/St Francis and proposed a fine of €500, then lifted to €750 by the Longford hearings committee.
A appeal to Leinster was then lodged by the club against the decision and, after a hearing was postponed in early March, it was then lost in the intervening months as Covid-19 restrictions kicked in, preventing GAA bodies from conducting such activities in an indoor setting.
It is understood that Leinster were aiming to hear the case at their next meeting, but Longford’s hearings committee had imposed a deadline of July 31 for payment of the fine and when that passed they decided to apply the full weight of rule 6.24 (c) which “shall involve a suspension of 48 weeks if a club/unit hasn’t paid a fine imposed for loss of revenue,” which in this case, Longford hearings deemed tobe€750.
However rule 7.7(c), which governs fines, allows for clubs and/or officers where fines have gone unpaid to be liable “to such sanctions as the Council or the Committee in Charge shall deem appropriate.”
Given the impositions on meetings that Covid-19 has placed, and even the capacity of a club to come up with such money to pay a fine when revenue-raising streams have been so badly affected, a lesser sanction could have been deemed more appropriate.
The suspension means no team from U-16 up can compete for the next 48 weeks and that no club members can participate in GAA activity. That impacts on everyone from referees – there are up to four from the club who take charge of games in the county – to the county’s Central Council delegate Gerry Hagan, who is also Killoe chairman.
Further down the line, Longford’s most prominent player, Michael Quinn, would be unavailable for intercounty games in the forthcoming championship and, in all probability, for most of 2021 if the suspension sticks.