Shane Cassells (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

It looks like we are poised to host the 2028 UEFA European Football Championship alongside the UK as we will be the only bidders when submissions close tomorrow. It is great news for football fans and our economy, which will be due to net somewhere in the region of €750 million from visitor spending. It is definitely a more realistic option than going for the 2032 World Cup. Given that we missed out on hosting games in last year's deferred European championship because of Covid, it is fantastic for football fans to see this happening. However, only today, we have already seen an issue develop with one of the main venues that could potentially be used for these games. We only have two: Croke Park and the Aviva Stadium. The issue pertains to Croke Park. UEFA prohibits the use of temporary seating at major championship finals. When the FAI has previously used Croke Park, such temporary seating has been installed on Hill 16. For the venue to be used, Hill 16 would have to be converted from a terrace to a stand. It would be ironic if a soccer tournament were to sound the death knell of one of the most famous terraces in the world.

A memo has been brought to Cabinet today by the Minister of State with responsibility for sport, Deputy Chambers, in support of the bid, and rightly so. We need the Government to back this bid as it did the bid for the Rugby World Cup. However, in doing so I ask the Minister of State to engage with the FAI and UEFA on the stadium issue from tomorrow with a view to allowing the prospect of safe standing. We have seen this practice return right across Europe. It came back in England this year, where the Hillsborough disaster initiated the conversion of terraces to stands. Safe standing has come back in right across Europe. I ask the Minister of State with responsibility for sport to engage on this issue right from the get-go. The Government is going to back this bid. We want to see it happen, we want it to be it successful and we want to see it in Croke Park. As a sports supporter and a GAA man, I want to see it happening in Croke Park but not at the cost of seeing an end to Hill 16.