No shelter from ticket storm for out-of-sync GAA
Costs incurred by the association are under unflattering scrutiny
IRELAND is one of the smaller countries on earth, but it’s big enough to make generalisations unreliable and often foolish. Enda Kenny knows that. He led Fine Gael into the 2016 general election under the strident banner, ‘Let’s keep the recovery going’.
The problem was, as became apparent to horrified ministers and TDs early on in the hustings, that the economic revival evident in urban areas had not spread to Ireland’s extremities.
The country, despite its modest size, is big enough to contain significant economic disparities, and in the spring of 2016 this cost Fine Gael victory in the election.
Three years on, GAA president John Horan has misread the economic runes as Kenny and his multitude of backroom schemers did.
‘Time is going to tell but if the economy keeps going the way it is, I don’t think it will be an issue,’ said Horan in defending the ticket price increases announced by the GAA a week ago.
Presuming that supporters all over the country have enough in their pockets to cover the increase because general economic indicators suggest Ireland is comfortable again, is fraught with danger.
Not everywhere in the country is booming like Dublin, has been a point made with the anger and rough-hewn intensity to be expected of social media.
But in this case, Twitter is reflecting a more general mood with some accuracy. Horan’s comments, and the price hike that occasioned them, are yet further instances of the GAA leadership being painfully out of sync with much of its membership.
Having to pay €20 rather than €15 into a National League game this afternoon will not beggar supporters, but raising prices in an organisation stalked by concerns of elitism is just not a good idea.
Horan explained that more money will be diverted to the club game, yet the problems besetting that fundamental area of the GAA have not been seriously addressed.
Club players have not been crying out for more investment; they want to play meaningful matches and they want an idea of when those games will happen.
But the radical restructuring of the GAA calendar required to facilitate this remains a remote prospect.
News of the price increases was tagged on to the end of a press release announcing the end of the hand-pass experiment ahead of the National League.
And that was a consequence of the staggering influence now wielded by inter-county managers; enough of them groused long and loud enough to scuttle the proposal before it could be meaningfully trialled.
It is the influence exerted by those same managers that has resulted in the diminishment of the club game, and as long as their enormous say goes unchallenged, as it now does, the club problem will not be solved.
Increasing ticket prices in the shadow of the Páirc Uí Chaoimh controversy also appears clumsy.
The leadership will argue that the money raised from price hikes will all go back into the association, but the disastrous project in Cork, and the frightening costs associated with it, do put the matter of the GAA and its spending under unflattering scrutiny.
As should its deal with the Gaelic Players Association. The threeyear agreement reached in July, 2016 will soon be up for renegotiation, and there was extensive disquiet about the first one, given it costs the GAA €6.2 million a year to fund it.
A new agreement on similar or increased terms will meet with even more unhappiness. This is partly due to the historical suspicion with which the GPA have been treated by some within the association.
But concerns about rampant elitism within the GAA have only grown in the three years since that first, lucrative agreement was made.
It is inevitable, and logical, that those who question the staggeringly generous terms of that deal, will complain about price increases falling on supporters.
If money is needed for insurance funds and player injury funds, as Horan explained, then perhaps these demands should be remembered when sitting across from the GPA leadership during talks.
There was a lively defence of the price increases from some commentators, with the value available to supporters who purchase their tickets in advance cited.
And it is true that those who plan their trips to matches will not pay as much as those looking to pay at the gate. But that is to miss the reason for anger this week.
Unhappiness does not stem from the narrow issue of climbing costs. This is, instead, about elitism. And it’s about complacency, too. The GAA should not mistake economic indicators for the mood of its people.
‘CONCERNS ABOUT RAMPANT ELITISM HAVE GROWN’