Sports Organisations
Seanad Éireann — 2026-05-21
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Mike Kennelly (FG), Labour Panel

I thank the Minister of State for his response. I respect everything he said about being proportionate, the GAA and values, broadcasting rights, commercial views and rights and all that. However, the one thing I did not get is that we need to start engagement with the GAA. We need to call it into the sports committee within these Houses and open this conversation up. This Government is doing its best to support the GAA across the country and so has every other government. They have kept pitches and clubhouses open and accessible to people who want to play football but then it comes to the biggest games of them all. I am not just talking about Kerry and Donegal. I know the Minister of State is a proud Donegal man. Donegal is a real rural county, like Kerry, and a lot of people cannot access that TV, and the Michael Murphys, Jason Foleys or David Cliffords of Kerry. They cannot.
I will give the Minister of State one word: "volunteerism". Many moons ago, an underage game was due to take place in Finuge, near Listowel. There was only one car and two adults available They put every kid they had into that car. They were stopped going over the bridge in Listowel as they headed for Finuge six miles out the road. When he stopped them, the garda said, "Oh my God. What's going on here?" The volunteer, the great man behind that wheel, said, "Guard, I'm on my way to an underage game six miles out the road". There were legs and heads everywhere in the car. The boot was open and there were legs hanging out. The guard said to him, "How many have you?", and he said, "If I had one more, I'd have a sub." That was years ago, and the same person is being prevented from watching the game next Saturday, which is wrong. I call on the Government to bring the GAA before the relevant committee in order to start the conversation. What is happening has to be reviewed.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-05-21/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:59+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-05-21