Duggan case ‘slipped through the net’, says GPA chief Farrell
By Paul Keane
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Gaelic Players Association chief Dessie Farrell believes former Cork footballer Diarmuid Duggan "slipped through the net" of the GAA’s welfare scheme.
Duggan revealed in Monday’s Irish Examiner how he retired from the game in 2009 due to persistent hip problems and was left €7,000 out of pocket following surgery.
Farrell, whose organisation made €3,000 available to Duggan through their benevolent fund, revealed that Cork chairman Bob Ryan was yesterday attempting to set up a meeting with Duggan. Both Farrell and GPA chairman Dónal Óg Cusack refused to offer any guarantees that Duggan will be fully reimbursed.
But there appeared a general acceptance that the player had been wronged and that an effort would now be made to resolve the issue.
"It’s one of these issues that are unfortunate and shouldn’t happen," said Farrell. "Within our own parameters we’ve done what we could for Diarmuid in relation to our own benevolent fund and the protocols around that. There are some technical issues around when the claims were lodged that need to be looked at a little bit. I know Dónal Óg spoke to Bob Ryan on Tuesday morning and they’re going to examine it more closely.
"The lesson here is what’s going on around us and the communication and this is probably one that has slipped through the net, somewhat.
"I know we’ve had dealings with county boards on a regular basis. Some of them are very good, some of them could do more in this area.
"We had a situation recently ourselves with the Dublin County Board and they were not found wanting in that regard. It is an unfortunate one. It possibly could have been handled better. It wouldn’t be acceptable in this day and age and you’d like to think that, going forward, they’ll be very few and far between, these sort of cases." Cusack concurred with Farrell that the situation used to be far more prevalent. He said: "That story is one of the reasons why you saw the emergence of the GPA, with issues like players getting injured and being out of pocket. It just can’t happen that a player is out of pocket from an injury — not in this day and age. It would be different if the money didn’t exist within the Association. I spoke to Bob this morning, as chairman of the Cork County Board, and I know he is looking to speak to Diarmuid and hopefully they can sit down and resolve it."
Cusack said that Duggan’s case had raised a number of issues which must be addressed.
"One of the lessons for us is that there is a job of work involved in educating players as to how to manage the injury scheme properly," he said.
"And the last thing is that communication is the key. We have seen in Cork over the last few years that we have gotten burnt more than most and a lot of the origins of the player strikes was out of bad communication. One of the worst things I see in this story is the lack of communication between the various stakeholders."
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This appeared in the printed version of the Irish Examiner Wednesday, February 22, 2012
