Jarlath Burns rules himself out of the running to be the next President of Ireland

THAT'S A PLUS: Uachtarán Chumann Lúthchleas Gael Jarlath Burns speaking on GAA+ during day two of the GAA Congress at The Abbey Hotel in Donegal. Photo by Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile

Jarlath Burns has distanced himself from speculation he will run as a candidate in the Irish presidential election later this year.

The GAA president insists he will return to work as principal of St Paul’s High School outside Newry when his term as uachtarán concludes in February 2027 despite rumours Sinn Féin are considering him as their candidate in the race to replace Michael D Higgins.

“Let me do that very clearly, that is not on my radar,” said Burns.

“My plan when I finish this job is to go back to St Paul's, Bessbrook to be principal of the school. That’s the place I love, the place I miss, even though this is the best job you could possibly have, that's where I belong, that's where I belong anyway.”

Burns was not at liberty to say how much it cost the GAA to buy out RTÉ from their 50% share of GAAGO to form their own GAA+ streaming service.

It is believed the figure was approximately €2million and the Irish Examiner understands former GAA president Larry McCarthy will chair a new committee assigned to the running of the pay-per-view platform.

Current GAAGO head Noel Quinn will oversee the rebranded initiative, which is expected to be launched in the coming weeks with the first games being televised in the opening round of the provincial football championships in early April.

As previously reported by this newspaper, Burns confirmed the old Elverys shop underneath the Hogan Stand on Jones Road will now become a broadcasting suite for GAA+.

Burns believes there will be a positive reaction to the new platform despite the controversy around GAAGO.

“Given the fact that all of our counties are now streaming and doing well out of it, it is the only way forward because it's either that or we don't have anybody covering those games.

“Either we cover them or they're not covered. Last year TG4 showed 222 live games. RTÉ, I think it was 45. I think six days out of seven you could watch GAA matches, which is almost saturation as well when you consider that we still want people to get into their car and drive to a GAA match. But we're very excited by the possibilities of GAA+.”

Burns does not envisage GAA+ taking some of TG4’s portfolio of matches in the next round of media rights talks.

“I can't see that happening, to be honest. I think what GAA+ will be doing will be taking that (games), which we don't already have.

“We don’t want to start bidding against companies that have done really, really well with what they have. Ten years ago, nobody was interested in Sigerson and then TG4 came along and they has raised the profile of it.

“We owe it to those stations, TV broadcasting companies that have done a great job with our games to work with them and to keep them in the position that they're in.”

Annual Congress in Donegal started on Friday with the withdrawal of a motion that had proposed GAA playing gear no longer be produced by an Irish manufacturer but an official GAA licensee.

Despite Croke Park's worries that the rule as it stand does not comply with EU law, counties had raised serious questions about the move and it was taken off the agenda.

“The first thing we should have done was to reassure our current kit manufacturers that this was not an attack on them,” said Burns.

“But we have to be Article 102 compliant, and that talks about the abuse of the dominant position and we have a dominant position because we are organising the GAA, so we have to be careful we don't abuse it.

"That's really what we're doing. And then the CCPC (Competition and Consumer Protection Commission), they're always interested in this sort of thing, and rightly so.”

Meanwhile, the 26 GAA county boards in the jurisdiction of the Republic of Ireland will be subjected to self risk reviews following discussions between Croke Park and the Revenue Commissioners.

The association’s national finance committee chairman Feargal McCormack said the mechanisms of the mass disclosures are currently being finalised with Revenue.

Counties will make a self-declaration for an agreed four-year period (2021-24), based on their calculation for 2024.

“This will hopefully allow officers to reference their most recent findings and records,” said McCormack.

“The findings in this year will then be extrapolated out to determine any liability for the years 2021 to 2023.”

The liabilities will be divided into six core payments – managers, backroom team members, players, full-time county staff, casual staff and volunteers and referees. It is not expected there will be any tax liabilities relating to referees.

Galway, Mayo and Wexford have been subject to full risk reviews but McCormack assured the self-assessment will be “significantly less demanding than a full Revenue audit”.

A county will have 60 days to complete their self review. Four pilot counties will be selected for the initial part of the process.