Óraid an Uachtaran 2025 Uinsionn Ó Nearaigh

Ba Mhaith liom fáilte a chuir roimh gach daoine anseo anocht.

You are all very welcome to our Connacht Convention here tonight.

As we leave behind us the 140th anniversary of the founding of our Association we have many items to reflect on. Overall, 2024 has been a good year for the province. I would like to begin by congratulating all our winners both at club and county. Galway took the senior honours and went on to contest the All Ireland final, where they were most unfortunate to narrowly loose out. I feel that they have some unfinished business to complete in 2025. Roscommon and Mayo were winners at U-20 and 17.

At Club level Cooleara/Strandhill were the surprise at senior level. They had a tough passage through county and province and are the first Sligo Club to win a Connacht Senior club title in many years.

Crossmolina and An Cheathrú Rua at Intermediate and Junior level are now in All Ireland Finals, and we wish them well.

We also wish our two Connacht referees the very best as they referee the two senior club finals this weekend. Liam Gordon (Galway) senior hurling and Paddy Neilan (Roscommon) senior football.

Loughrea were our representatives at Senior Club Hurling level and were unfortunate to lose out at semifinal stage while Tynagh/Abbey-Duniry made it to the final and again were heartbroken by a late goal to deny them victory. Easkey were our champions at Junior and were beaten by the eventual champions.

As a result of endeavours on the field many from the province claimed individual awards. I congratulate our All Star and Championship 15 award winners and it was a fitting end of year for Galway’s long serving footballer Paul Conroy who picked up the player of the year award. Well done Paul and richly deserved.

All Ireland titles at LGFA and camogie club came west again and congratulations to both Kilkerrin/Clonberne and Sarsfields on their recent successes, Leitrim Senior LGFA team brought great honour to their county with victory in the Intermediate All Ireland.

Scór, Handball, Féile and wheelchair Hurling are some of the many other activities continually happening here in Connacht.

I congratulate the County Boards for their continued developments around the County Grounds. Massive improvements are ongoing and both Tuam and Pearse Stadium in Galway have seen major upgrade recently with the new stand and now the new floodlights in Salthill ready to be commissioned. Dr. Hyde Park has really undergone major renovations and the end result is a credit to all involved. Páirc Seán Mac Diarmada in Carrick has a new pitch laid and more works are to follow around the ground in the coming year and MacHale Park Castlebar and Markievicz Park in Sligo have also benefitted from recent upgrades.

It was very disappointing to see the suspension of the FBD league and all preseason competitions for a year. I am yet to be convinced by some of the arguments for their removal. Player burn out because of the season extension and costs to counties by an earlier start to the season. It will be interesting to see if counties make a significant saving because of no preseason competition, and to my knowledge players playing in the early competitions had little impact on burnout. The result is that the competitions here in Connacht were a major source of income and if the council are to continue to honour all their commitments, then replacement funding will have to come from somewhere.

The GAA as an organisation is continually expanding and with this growth comes additional pressures. Full time staff are constantly under pressure to keep up with their work. More staff are required, which in turn adds additional cost which again needs more income to sustain.

The report commissioned last year on the Economic and Social Value of Gaelic Games on the Island of Ireland provides us with all the hard facts. Government receives €192.6 million in direct and indirect taxation from Gaelic Games. €1.056 billion for the replacement cost of volunteering. Maybe with these sorts of figures we, as an organisation should be more robust when it comes to negotiations with government for funding as I feel that traditionally we have been shy in promoting our real value to the economy and requesting matching funding to reflect that.

If full time staff are under pressure, then the volunteer is equally feeling the strain. Volunteer recruitment is getting more difficult. Some of the reasons are that there is an increase in regulatory requirements, changing demographics,

reduced disposable time and the negativity and abuse of volunteers. To their credit, clubs and counties still find ways around recruitment challenges. However, results from a recent club survey, show that three months after their AGM, 19 clubs had not filled the position of chairperson and more than that had failed to fill the role of secretary and treasurer. This has to be a concern and obviously lesser roles in clubs show bigger vacancies and for longer periods.

There are some positives too. Current club officers are now well educated with high numbers having degree or higher level of education and officers age profile is much younger than before which augers well for our association. Another interesting fact emerging from the survey is the time spent in holding a role. Chairpersons around four years while other officers tend to spend between four and five years in their position. What this tells us is that there is more officer burnout than player burnout.

John in his report has delt with the many aspects of the GAA here in Connacht. I congratulate him on another fine piece of work. I thank him and the rest of my fellow officers for all their help during the year as I do the staff and all the volunteers around the province for the courtesy they have shown me in my first year. I thank all the council members and representatives as well as all sub committees for their ongoing work during the year. I congratulate Cathal Cregg and Damien Curley for their work in developing the new hurling plan. Adrian Hassett as always does trojan work on the planning and physical side of the house, and Brian Mangan manages our media very well.. Kurt Reinhardt our facilities manager left us during the year to take on further challenges. We thank him for his work and wish him well.

I thank all our sponsors, our accountant and auditors the media the staff in Croke Park and the county officers here in Connacht for their continued support. I know that many of your have had a torrid time in recent months in the run up to your conventions and well done to you all.

As our treasurer Anthony Flaherty has completed his term. I thank him for all his help to me personally and for the contribution he has made to the council. John Murphy also leaves us this year and again I thank him for all his work and for his continued help and support after vacating the chair. He had a very successful year on the National stage and will be a continued support to Connacht Council. Dermot Gannon takes over as treasurer who is no stranger to us having served on the council for the past few years. I wish you well

Dermot and I know you will have no bother. Dermot is replaced on the council by the new Sligo delegate Ronan Higgins from the Eastern Harps club. I welcome Ronan and know that he comes with great experience having done marvellous work in his own club down through the years.

Many families have suffered bereavements during the year and John has mentioned them in his report. I offer my sympathies to all and especially to the families of two former council members whom I knew very John O Mahony and Luke Fitzmaurice. May they Rest In Peace.

Finally, I would simply like to thank each one of you gathered here tonight for your contributions to the GAA. Happy new year and good luck for the year ahead.

Go Raibh agaibh.

Uinsionn