Cork Finances

[Baile Brigín 2]

Getting interesting. Long story short there is a forensic audit into Cork finances in general to find the missing PuC funds in particular. Along the way the guts of €200k were found for grants never allocated that were not booked in the accounts.

I assume a hangover from Frank but the response being to complain its gone public isn't reassuring.

https://m.independent.ie/sport/gaelic-games/cork-gaa-chairman-insists-there-was-no-misappropriation-of-funds-followingaudit-and-risk-committee-discovery-40493731.html

[Baile Brigín 2]

More detail here.

https://www.irishexaminer.com/sport/gaa/arid-40301258.html

[twohands!!!]

Getting interesting. Long story short there is a forensic audit into Cork finances in general to find the missing PuC funds in particular. Along the way the guts of €200k were found for grants never allocated that were not booked in the accounts.

I assume a hangover from Frank but the response being to complain its gone public isn't reassuring.

https://m.independent.ie/sport/gaelic-games/cork-gaa-chairman-insists-there-was-no-misappropriation-of-funds-followingaudit-and-risk-committee-discovery-40493731.html

Cork GAA delegates express alarm at audit leak
In a prepared statement, Marc Sheehan reiterated that "no financial irregularities have occurred. Funds have been treated properly, accounted for, and correctly applied".
Cork GAA delegates express alarm at audit leak
Páirc Uí Chaoimh. Pic; Larry Cummins

TUE, 01 JUN, 2021 - 21:43
JOHN FOGARTY
Alarm at how the discovery of €176,000 in two bank accounts came into the public domain dominated Cork GAA's monthly county board meeting on Tuesday night.

As chairman Marc Sheehan revealed he hoped the full report by the county's audit and risk committee would be available at the next board meeting on July 6, several delegates expressed disappointment about how the details of the probe were revealed by the Irish Examiner late last week.

In a prepared statement, Sheehan reiterated that "no financial irregularities have occurred. Funds have been treated properly, accounted for, and correctly applied". He added the executive will act and be guided by the final recommendations of the audit and risk committee.

Sheehan later expressed frustration with how the board was compelled to publish an interim report on foot of this newspaper's report of it. He said: "It is a matter of significant regret and concern that information relating to this process came into the public domain and subsequently to the attention of board officers on Monday, May 24, and necessitated the publication of an interim report by the audit and risk committee interrupting their important work, and bringing about a situation where Cork GAA as an entity was subject to comment, speculation, and conjecture, which was unhelpful and potentially damaging to the association and to individuals.

"This is particularly concerning as those charged with the governance of the association at the present time, that is the principal officers, acted swiftly and appropriately to ensure that the issue was reviewed in a thorough and timely manner."

Sheehan entertained observations on the interim report but asked for questions to be held until the final document is published. Former Cork chairman and current Munster Council delegate Ger Lane said the revelation was "very damaging to the association in Cork" but highlighted that there was no wrongdoing.

"The most important point is that there is no mention of any misappropriation, no money missing, no-one had done anything to these accounts that impinges on the finances of the Cork County Board. That needs to be clearly stated and the people who operated these accounts did so in a very good manner and a very honest manner and I think it's very important to outline that clearly and loudly."

Lane said it was no surprise to him that the accounts existed and doesn't believe they were a shock to other individuals in the Cork County Board. He questioned how the information about the trawl of the account was revealed.

Addressing Sheehan, he said: "I know leaks are common but surely something of this nature is hugely damaging to the executive of the Cork County Board and the Cork GAA in general. I don't know how you're handling that, I'm sure it's a difficult one for you, but I think it's quite disgraceful, to be honest about it."

Freemount delegate John O'Flynn asked if the report would be circulated in advance of the July 6 meeting. Sheehan responded that it would be initially considered by the executive before any decision was made.

Kinsale delegate Paul McCarthy said it was "an absolute disgrace" that the details of the interim report were published last week. "What has to be of grave concern and it seems to be a trend that has developed in the last year or so or maybe two years is this leaking of information to the papers prior to delegates, clubs, board officers, whatever. There is somebody leaking information to the papers and that needs to be rooted out of the board and I think it's incumbent on the chairman to sort this matter out."

St Nicholas' Jerry Howe offered: "This was a nothing issue in the sense that there was no money misappropriated or gone astray in any way and that these accounts had no effect on the balance sheet of the board."

Rathpeacon's Eamonn Hawe expressed concern at how previous speakers were not focusing on the matter in hand. "All on us, on behalf of Cork GAA people, it's been a very embarrassing week with what went on and the way things happened. We look forward to the report at the next meeting but I would say tonight it's just a little bit disappointing (that) maybe people are not focusing on the real issue.

"A distraction has been put out there tonight about leaks and things like that. That's an issue in itself but it's not the core issue so I think it would be nice at the July meeting to have a discussion on the substance of the actual issue and a separate discussion on the leak. I think it's very important to decouple the two of these because they are two very different issues."

In his statement, Sheehan opened: "An interim report has been issued by the audit and risk committee to the executive committee for consideration and a statement was provided to clubs and boards members on Friday last, May 28.

"Information in relation to the accounts was provided as part of the statement issued and based on the audit and risk committee's work to date it is confident of the efficacy of the treatment of the funds involved and that all funds have been accounted for properly correctly and have been properly applied."

https://www.irishexaminer.com/sport/gaa/arid-40303949.html

The actual statement Cork GAA relased is at the link below

The bit about

Due to commercially and personally sensitive content, it is summarised in the attached statement.
This matter will be discussed at our scheduled County Committee meeting on Tuesday, June 1st

is standard cover-up behaviour.
I'd love a delegate to ask what exactly is both the commercially and personally sensitive content being referred to and how this is a justification for not providing all the relevant details.

https://gaacork.ie/2021/05/28/statement-on-behalf-of-cork-gaa/

The fact that 7 different accounts were set up when there were only 2 different functions for this money - 1) the helmet and hurley subsidy fund and 2) players holiday funds do give the impression of incompetence more than anything else. The fact that Cork had no use for the player holiday fund in a decade says worlds about how Cork were doing on the pitch.

What is seriously puzzling is that the Treasurer [Pearse Murphy] was in place for 20 years - from 1997 to 2017.
If there was a changeover of personnel, you could see how detail about accounts could possibly have been lost in the handover but when the same person was in situ for all the time, it really beggars belief how the accounts were forgotten about.

http://archives.gaacork.ie/contentPage/31265/county_board_officers

I would say that there are quite a few folk involved in the Pairc Ui Chaoimh project who would be worried about what a proper review might turn up, so any suggestion that there are leaks from the audit would have them paranoid about other stuff coming out. This audit and risk committee threatened to resign en masse in 2019 about the way the board were presenting the financial accounts to the annual convention. I would be shocked if the leaks weren't coming from that direction. I would not be a bit surprised if this was done because the folks in power were planning on covering these hidden account up as much as possible - I'm not suggesting they would keep them completely hidden but more they would be added away into the notes of the next financial accounts and any explanation wouldn't make any specific mention that they had been unaware of them, but cover the move in confusing legal/financial double-speak.

I remember reading an newspaper article at the time where the Cork chairman at the time was actually boasting about the number of Cork firms who had been awarded contracts.
A review into how contracts were handed out would be very illuminating I'd say, especially as regards links between those firms who got contracts and those deciding who got contracts.

Worth remembering that the Department of Expenditure didn't want to release public funds for the project at one stage because what Cork GAA had submitted as the cost-benefit for the stadium was regarded as completely inadequate. What I heard was that even after a revised cost-benefit was submitted the Dept still felt it was inadequate but were over-ruled by the politicians to release the cash. It would be very interesting to go back and compare what the department said and what Cork GAA said at the time.

Despite the fact that the stadium's capacity is 45k, there have been only three GAA matches with a crowd of over 30k [none over 35k] since the redevoplement.

The initial cost when the redevelopment was first proposed was around the €60 million mark.
The final cost was around €100 million in the end.
Would be interesting to look at where the money went and how necessary the various spending was.

I would say that there is a lot of politics behind closed doors between the old guard who want to keep everything behing closed doors and those on the audit and risk committee who would favour letting the sunlight in.  It will be interesting to see what exactly gets into the public domain.