Longford delegate Clarke claims Jarlath Burns contravened rule in allowing pre-season vote

James Clarke, who spoke at the Central Council against the Gaelic Players Association’s motion to cancel next January’s competitions, insists that the vote breached the GAA’s Official Guide

GAA president Jarlath Burns

The legitimacy of the decision to suspend the GAA’s preseason competitions next year has been questioned.

Longford Central Council delegate James “Mel” Clarke claims the Disputes Resolution Authority (DRA) would quash the action taken at the meeting last Saturday.

Clarke, who spoke at the Central Council against the Gaelic Players Association’s motion to cancel next January’s competitions, insists that the vote breached the GAA’s Official Guide.

Rule 4.3 in Part I states: “Any decision taken at a duly convened meeting of any Committee or Council of the Association, shall not be rescinded at a subsequent meeting, unless due notice of intention to propose rescindment has been previously conveyed to each member, and the consent of three-fifths of those present entitled to vote and voting is obtained.” 

Clarke maintains there was no prior warning that a vote would be taken last Saturday. He says there was no mention of it in a pre-Central Council briefing with GAA president Jarlath Burns and director of club, player and games administration Feargal McGill.

“There was no advanced notice at all of any intention to propose to abandon the preseasons before the meeting. There was an online briefing last week, which lasted about 11 minutes, and the CCCC (Central Competitions Control Committee) said they had conducted a survey with the counties and the result of that was 61% of the respondents were in favour of retaining the preseason.

“That’s the only information that was provided to Central Council before Saturday’s meeting. Jarlath (Burns) did not give any indication (that there was going to be a vote). In fact, he didn’t speak on it at all. He only introduced it and Feargal McGill conducted it.” 

It is only the GAA’s intention to suspend the pre-season competitions for 2025 but Clarke is adamant that a postponement still breaches the rule. “It’s changing a decision that was made previously so there’s no halfway house with that.” Clarke, who added Dublin were keen to speak in favour of the pre-season competitions being retained but didn’t due to time constraints, is convinced the decision would be overturned on the grounds of it not following the required procedure.

“If it were to go to the DRA, it wouldn’t last. It’s just wrong. The decision is wrong in every respect. There was a review of Central Council last year when a two-pass rule was agreed: if something was being proposed, it was discussed at the meeting, brought back by the delegates to their counties, discussed and a decision made at the next meeting.

“It’s very unfair to put a proposal on top of Central Council delegates and ask them to vote on it without having time to think about it at the meeting never mind time to consult with their counties.

“Nobody wants hassle and nobody wants confrontation but the bottom line is the process was wrong. If a member of Central Council or a county bring a case to the DRA to quash the decision, it probably wouldn’t be a healthy thing to do but Clare did it last year in relation to the U20 rule and they only lost because it was out of time. Any claim to the DRA has to be made within seven days.” Clarke, whose county Longford have won the O’Byrne Cup the past two seasons, sees a lot more challenge games being played in January. He suggests they may struggle to arrange such fixtures as stronger football counties, which was not an issue in the Leinster pre-season competition.

“Every county will be playing challenge games in January. In fairness to (GPA chief executive) Tom Parsons, he has this idea that players are getting too much football. Maybe there are but getting rid of the pre-season games in January doesn’t mean they’re not going to play any football games in January.

“The county managers will call in the players and say, ‘If you want to be on my panel, this is what you’ve got to do. If you don’t, then you know what will happen.’ There will be challenge games every weekend so what will be gained?

“It will be said that challenge games are not the same as competitive games but the preseason were never really used as competitive games. The only reason we won the last couple of years was we put out our full team in all of the games and every other county were trialling players and playing their main players behind closed doors. We hosted a full-blown Armagh-Mayo challenge game last January.” On Wednesday, the Ulster Council said they accepted Central Council’s decision to ditch the McKenna Cup but admitted “the decision will result in the curtailment of some of the programmes that Ulster GAA offers.

“However, the decision has been made and there is now a clear onus on the GPA to ensure that the return to train protocols and date are strictly adhered to by their members."