DRA eases post-Connolly ruling fears
Parnell’s GAA Club in London had claimed that a referee in charge of one of their London SFC group games had reported the incorrect score and the error had cost the club a place in the semi-finals on the basis of points differentials.
The resultant objection has resulted in the county championship being placed on hold for over a month as their case proceeded through the London CCC and the Provincial Hearings Committee in Britain before being dismissed by the Disputes Resolution Authority (DRA) after a six-hour meeting.
The decision was not unexpected as it is extremely rare a sports tribunal will overturn a referee’s in-play decision, but the key point was that Parnells had leaned on the Connolly precedent in claiming there was a lack of clarification by the hearing bodies who had heard their case.
The DRA panel of Donard King, Fionnuala McGrady and Jarlath Burns was not convinced and ruled that, in line with the DRA’s jurisdiction, the claim should be dismissed as the previous hearings, specifically at the provincial level, satisfied the test of rationality and reasonableness.
This was the first such case post-Connolly, which means its status as a precedent has been greatly diminished and should theoretically aid committees around the country who have been inundated with so-called clarification requests from defendants attempting to get off on a technicality.
The key point in all this is that GAA hearings committees are not deemed to be courts of law which are bound by the same strict laws on evidence and procedure, as was suggested by the majority in the earlier Connolly decision.
They are, instead, seen to be private tribunals manned by volunteers who are charged with reaching fair and reasonable decisions on the issues before them according to the GAA’s own rules of evidence and procedure.
The GAA’s entire disciplinary system had been called into question towards the end of the inter-county championship season on the back of a handful of high-profile player suspensions which were controversially overturned.
Tyrone’s Tiernan McCann had an eight-week ban for feigning injury imposed and removed, Mayo’s Kevin Keane was also cleared to play in a semi-final despite seeing red for a strike on Donegal’s Michael Murphy while Connolly was also reprieved after a separate striking offence.
