The Gaelic Players Association (GPA) chief executive, Dessie Farrell, intimated yesterday that strike action might be the next step should the GAA and the Government fail to agree on how to distribute the €5 million put aside by the previous Minister for Sport John O'Donoghue to compensate players.
Farrell went directly to the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, to discuss the impasse and is expected to meet formally with the new Minister for Sport, Séamus Brennan, in the next fortnight.
In the interim, the GPA will hold provincial meetings for their intercounty membership to gauge the mood of players.
"We can't overstate how serious the situation is now," said Farrell. "We've been pushing this since the 2002 Finance Bill when professional sportspeople were awarded a very lucrative incentive through the tax system, and the situation still remains that our players are being discriminated against."
"The people who are in charge need to get their heads around that and sort it out quickly. Players won't tolerate this much longer and we're getting that loud and clear from players across the board."
What is the biggest stumbling block?
"Well, the Government have outlined how they planned to introduce this scheme and it's through infrastructural grants and they have been consistent on this. The GAA say they are not going to accept that, so therein lies the impasse, and the two of them (the GAA and the Government) in conjunction with ourselves need to sit down fairly quickly and find a solution to this because neither (the Government nor the GAA) are blameless in this I believe."
Responding to Farrell's comments, GAA president Nickey Brennan said: "We have explained to the former Minister for Sport (O'Donoghue) that the method he was talking about for paying the €5 million via GAA infrastructural grants is not a runner. We're certainly not going to revisit that.
"Finding a method that is satisfactory to everybody is probably the issue. We have no problem with the Government paying the money to the players - and we've said that all along. We have no problem if they want the Irish Sports Council to be the facilitators in that process.
"I think the (GPA's) frustration should not be taken out on the GAA."
