Sports funding will be tied to equal access for women, minister warns 

'You better believe it, absolutely': Thomas Byrne also commits to 'significant' cut if board-level gender equality targets are not met

Minister of State for Sport Thomas Byrne told the 'Irish Examiner': 'I will not be funding capital projects where men and women don't have similar access.' File picture: Colin Keegan/Collins

GAA, soccer, rugby, and other sports organisations are to have capital funding completely withdrawn if they fail to provide men and women the same access to facilities, the sports minister has warned.

With applications for the latest round of sports capital grants due to open in the coming weeks, Minister of State Thomas Byrne has said that even after funding is granted it will be pulled if grounds and facilities are not equally available to male and female teams.

Mr Byrne has already announced that national sporting organisations will face significant funding cuts if female representation on boards doesn't reach at least 40% by the end of the year.

However, he is now going further by linking sports capital grants to equal access.

"I will not be funding capital projects where men and women don't have similar access," Mr Byrne told the Irish Examiner.

He will now be expecting clubs to give priority to male and female senior teams when it comes to the use of facilities and to then work down through minor and under age teams on the same basis.

What I'm saying is men and women must have similar access because I'm getting reports around the country, particularly in some counties at county level, where the access terms are different.

Gemma Begley, the equality, diversity and inclusion manager with the Gaelic Players Association (GPA), said there are still "really issues" in relation to access, with men's club teams sometimes given priority over women's county teams.

"Women's teams can be very low down the pecking order, if they are even in the pecking order at all."

She said accessing the county centres of excellence can be particular difficulty for female county teams and where access is provided, the women's side is sometimes charged for the use of pitches which are available for free for their male counterparts.

Senior ladies teams this winter had a real challenge in finding training facilities. I know some who had to train in other counties because they couldn't find pitches. That uncertainty adds a real stress on players. 

In recent weeks, the Ladies Football Ulster Senior Championship final was moved from Clones to Derry after a men's league game was fixed for the stadium, despite prior agreement that the women would be facilitated, it was claimed.

While welcoming the linking of funding to equal access, Ms Begley said the measure cannot simply become a box-ticking exercise which is not implemented after the grants are paid out.

Mr Byrne insisted that if organisations can't certify that men and women have similar access, funding for a particular venue or facility will be withdrawn.

The most recent board composition snapshot, which was published in December by Sport Ireland, shows that the average percentage of women on boards of national governing bodies of sport has increased from 24% in 2019 to 36% in 2022

By the end of last year, the ‘Big Three’ — the Football Association of Ireland (FAI), Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) and Irish Rugby Football Union (IRFU) — had yet to reach the 40% board membership requirement to benefit from State funding from next year.

"We don't want this to be a threat, we want it to be more of a carrot", Mr Byrne said in relation to what he described as a "significant" cut if the gender target for boards is not reached.

Asked if he would follow through on that threat, he said: "You better believe it, absolutely."

Mr Byrne said all of the national sporting organisations have said that they will do this, but this target still has to be met.

A spokesperson for the FAI said the organisation is committed to reaching the proposed number of female Board Members by the end of the year.

"The FAI is also committed to providing the best possible facilities and access to all of our participants and all FAI representative teams have equal access to the same supports and facilities," the spokesperson added.