Páraic Duffy, Ard Stiúrthóir of the GAA, released his Annual Report for 2015 in Croke Park on Tuesday morning.
Click here to read the full report

The Annual Report is the Ard Stiúrthóir's main opportunity to give a public review of the Association's activities and to discuss prevailing issues.

In this year's report, Páraic Duffy reflects on a number of areas, including:

- The Structure of Congress and the possibility of change
- Composition and succession arrangements for Central Committees

• The state of Gaelic football
• Discipline within games
• The Disciplinary structures of the GAA
• The need to abolish the Interprovincial Championships
• Relationships between players and county committees
• Distribution of finance within the GAA

Meanwhile, in a powerful conclusion to his annual report, the Ard Stiúrthóir addresses some central issues not directly addressed earlier in the report. He cautions that while 2015 was a year of major debate in the areas of senior championship structures, fixtures scheduling and player overtraining and burnout, the possibility of the status quo remaining in place after Congress 2016 remains considerable.

On this, he writes: "In this context, Congress 2016 is an important gathering as there are critical decisions to be taken on all these issues.

"Where the structure of the football championship is concerned, once we decided – after long debate – to retain the provincial system, options were limited. And it is unlikely that hurling structures will change. If we do decide to change structures at Congress, the task will be to explain and market the new structures and to do our best to have them fulfil their potential.

"But if we decide not to change the structures, then let us accept the current structures as the best that are available to us, accept what has been agreed, and accept, too, that it is time to stop talking about structures and to deal with what is and not with what ought to be or might have been. Our time and energies will be needed to face the many other issues we need to address."

Elsewhere in the conclusion, he addresses a fear, expressed recently by Tyrone Secretary Dominic McCaughey, that pressures on club volunteers and a culture change within the GAA towards a 'training and coaching industry', has led to "officer burnout" and a shortage of GAA volunteers throughout the country.

"It seems to me that the choices we have made and the practices we have allowed to develop have led us to a point in the Association’s development where we need to ask ourselves a fundamental question about our essential values, about what is the Association’s most important work," Páraic Duffy writes, addressing the importance of placing the club at the centre of the GAA's value system.

In a stark finish to his report, he warns of the consequences of not doing this.

"...in the anxious times we live in, where the global and international seem to equate mostly with menace and distress, we can draw solace from the local, the small, the community, the club.

"This is where our Association began, where it lives and from where it draws its strength. There is great vibrancy and enthusiasm in our clubs, the fruit of tremendous and heartening dedication by members committed to the ideals of the GAA.

"These are the people we need to support through our decisions at Congress. Guided by their spirit, we will not go far wrong. Neglect them, and we lose touch with the heart and soul of the GAA."

In terms of the headline issues mentioned at the start of this article, the Ard Stiúrthóir goes into considerable detail on a number of key issues, as follows:
** CONGRESS**

"In terms of the full Congress assembly, it is difficult to know how it might be made more participative. A lot of good work is done each year on rule amendments that is necessary and productive. It is in the very nature of many of the proposals that seek to amend rules (as from the Rules Advisory Committee) that the benefits are obvious and non-controversial, and thus unlikely to generate much debate. 

"For delegates, such deliberations can be a tedious (if necessary) part of Congress. In each of the past three years we have organised a pre Congress briefing for key county officers on the motions to ensure that delegates understand the details of all the motions before them. And with the Finance and Ard Stiúrthóir’s reports available to units and to the public well in advance of Congress, much informal debate will already have taken place on issues raised."
** CENTRAL COMMITTEES**

Páraic Duffy highlights a recent report by Deloitte, taken at the request of the GAA's Audit Committee, into the Association's Committee Governance and Structures.

He notes the key recommendations as follows: 

• the need to review succession arrangements for committees so as to avoid corporate memory loss and to improve continuity of committee membership
• the ongoing need to evaluate the number and size of committees;
• the importance of matching the skillsets of members with needs of committees;
• the constant assessment of progress against strategic objectives

THE STATE OF GAELIC FOOTBALL

In this section, while Páraic Duffy acknowledges fears over the perceived negativity of modern Gaelic football, he urges a sense of "perspective and proportion". He also defends the introduction of the black card, expressing surprises that there were calls from some quarters to remove it in 2015.

He also reflects briefly here on the prevailing debate about Gaelic football championship stuctures, noting that it "takes but a single one-sided result in the provincial championships to spark a demand for an overhaul of the structure of the provincial and All-Ireland football championships."

Referring to the recent discussion and debate at Central Council level regarding championship structures, he writes: 

"There was little appetite for removing or downgrading the provincial championships, nor was there a consensus on how the present championship model might be improved. There was recognition that there are some counties that cannot realistically aspire to winning either a provincial or an All Ireland title, yet no suggested amendments to the current structure offer credible solutions to address this situation."

DISCIPLINE WITHIN GAMES

Whilst acknowledging the generally high standards of discipline within the GAA, Páraic Duffy notes the unfortunate increase in the practice of 'sledging' and unsporting behaviour, urging a collective effort from players and coaches to improve behaviour.

The report also refers to incidents arising from an Armagh v Dublin challenge game last July as "one of the most disappointing events of the past year". During that game, Dublin footballer Davy Byrne received facial injuries and was hospitalised and Páraic Duffy says that "the efforts of CCCC to investigate the matter followed an all too depressing pattern," noting that "no assistance was forthcoming from the counties in bringing the player to account."

"It will probably be considered naïve on my part to criticise the position taken by the counties, but the misguided loyalty that protects players who engage in violent behaviour on the pitch can only be seen, by those concerned with the good of the game, as a failure of leadership. Group solidarity is one thing; a code of silence that condones violence is quite another."   

DISCIPLINARY STRUCTURES

Páraic Duffy defends the GAA's disciplinary structures, referring to criticism which followed Diarmuid Connolly's successful appeal to the DRA ahead of the Dublin v Mayo replay last season.

Referring to what he says is the "familiar refrain of 'they are not fit for purpose', he strongly defends the current structures. "For my part, I do not believe that there is any fundamental weakness in our disciplinary structures. I may have been surprised by the decisions announced in the specific cases mentioned..." he writes, before noting what he believes is the fundamental point. "The lesson is simple: a wrong decision in no way indicates an inadequate structure."

THE INTERPROVINCIAL CHAMPIONSHIPS

Referring to the cancellation of the Interprovincial Championships before Christmas, the Ard Stiúrthóir acknowledged at Croke Park on Tuesday that the 2015 competitions would now not take place. Referring to the continual lack of public interest in the competitions, and the failure of various proposals to improve interest in the competitions over the years, he concludes:

"Maybe now is the time to accept the inevitable: our crowded playing calendar and a lack of interest among players and the public tell us that the competitions have no viable future."

DISTRIBUTION OF FINANCE WITHIN THE GAA

In the introduction to his report, Páraic Duffy notes how financial resoures have started to create a major gap between the strongest and weakest counties in Gaelic football.

"A significant number of counties do not have the financial resources, either from commercial income and/or through their fundraising capacity, to be serious contenders to win an All-Ireland title," he writes. "This is becoming a permanent structural imbalance in competitiveness which, when combined with the unequal population distribution over counties, reduces potential All-Ireland winners to a relatively few counties."

Later on in the report, he addresses the issue of funding and financing again in a different context. Referring to criticism of the GAA which came from Dublin GAA last year, where a charge of "Scrooge-like behaviour against Central Council" was made due to Dublin feeling aggrieved at the amount of funding allocated to them for their holiday fund, Páraic Duffy wrote the following:

"Dublin received the standard grant of €80,000 which goes to All-Ireland finalists. Having applied for additional funding due to their involvement in the All-Ireland semi-final replay with Mayo, Dublin were awarded a further €15,000.

"Considering that Dublin enjoys a much higher level of current funding from Central Council than any
other county, that it enjoys vastly greater commercial revenues than other counties, that it incurs lower costs in terms of players’ travelling expenses to games and training than all other counties and that it has a far greater fundraising capacity than most, the charge of Scrooge-like behaviour against Central Council was disappointing and misplaced."

**

The report is wide-ranging and covers many topics not addressed directly above. Among the other topics covered in detail are as follows:

• Media and broadcast rights for GAA
• Player overtraining and fixtures calendar debate
• The International Rules
• Relationships between players and county committees
• Third-level competitions
• Anti-doping
• Concussion
• Click here to read the report in full, and look for the relevant sections. Below this article is a download link for the report.