Clubs demand voice on Strategic Plan

GAA clubs in Cork are on a collision course with the Cork County Board regarding the proposed Strategic Plan, it emerged over the weekend.

Cork GAA Club Forum sources say clubs feel isolated and uninformed when it comes to the proposed plans to change radically the way that under-age and junior games are being run in Cork.

The clubs are seeking face to face meetings with the Board to outline their concerns, principally on the lack of consultation, and to hear more details on what is being planned for 2011.

Clubs also have concerns on the way the proposed plan is being pushed through without sufficient consultation on the final report since that was launched over six months ago.

Tomás Ryan, Chairman of the Forum said: “No-one seems to have any idea how these proposed new changes will affect clubs, players, parents and supporters but the strangest thing is that the county board doesn’t seem to want to engage with the people that it prepared the plan for.

“Clubs have not been told who will serve on the new regional juvenile boards, how these people will be selected and who will be grading the teams. Clubs are fearful that the plan will be implemented without sufficient consultation and are asking that the vote at convention which the CCB are committed to, according to page 25 of the report, be honoured.”

The board is meeting divisional boards at the moment but has not indicated it is willing to change the plan or if they have formalised the new structures of the regional boards.

The divisional boards’ questions remain unanswered regarding how the members of these new boards will be selected or whether they will be hand-picked and appointed by the county board.

Sources in the club forum said last weekend: “Clubs were delighted to submit ideas in the workshops last February, but at no stage were they told that this would be the only time that they would be consulted in this important process of improving the structures of Cork GAA.”

Club forum representatives say that if the board is serious about implementing the strategic plan, and if the new board is to have any credibility, then this will require the changing or amending of some by-laws in order to ensure that the process of change is both legal and democratic.

“In proposing radical changes to our structures in Cork, there is an onus on us to ‘get it right’,” said club forum sources.