DRA finally explain Moran decision

THE DECISION of the Disputes Resolution Authority (DRA) in quashing the suspension of Dublin's Colin Moran last July has finally been published. But anyone hoping for a light to be shone on one of the DRA's most controversial decisions will be disappointed.

Moran had been suspended for four weeks after a foul committed in the Leinster semi-final against Westmeath's Dermot Bannon - for which he received a yellow card during the match - was upgraded to a red-card offence after the match referee reviewed the incident at the request of the Croke Park's Central Competitions Control Committee (CCCC).

The CCCC then recommended the four-week suspension, which was imposed after a personal hearing by the Central Hearings Committee (CHC).

The player appealed the suspension to the Central Appeals Committee and having been turned down took his case to the GAA's independent arbitration tribunal, the DRA, which lifted the ban.

It was already leaked into the public arena that none of the technical grounds on which Dublin and the player took their case had succeeded.

Instead, in a decision with serious implications for similar cases in the future, the DRA made their finding on the basis that the CHC decision had been effectively wrong.

The bar at which decisions can be overturned for non-technical reasons is considered very high in Ireland where according to the decision of Mr Justice Henchy in The State (Keegan) v Stardust Victims Compensation Tribunal [1986] if there has been no error in procedure or in law, the courts could only intervene if "the impugned decision plainly and unambiguously flies in the face of reason and common sense".

In a three-line determination the DRA cited the Henchy test and duly decided that the decision of the CHC had failed it. It is not known why such a perfunctory explanation took nearly two months to publish.