Open book policy just makes cents

LAST year the wise old men from Crossmaglen tabled a motion at the Armagh convention calling for the Gaelic Players’ Association (GPA) to publish a detailed account of how GAA funding for their organisation was spent in 2010. Crossmaglen asked that these accounts be made available to all clubs in the GAA.

This is an eminently sensible proposal. But why should such measures be limited to the GPA but not Armagh, and indeed every other county board in the country? When you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear, and this is what makes the GAA’s guarded accounting so annoying.

Every December county boards email their annual reports to the media. They are generally awash with perennial musings about indiscipline and weepy laments about Scór.