Tim Lombard (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thought the Cathaoirleach had forgotten me. I would like to raise an issue that he is very much aware of and I am sure the Acting Leader is very much aware of, which is the unbelievable scenario we have with GAAGO, which is having a huge impact on how GAA games can be watched throughout the entire country. We have a bizarre scenario whereby, of the four Cork hurling matches in this year's Munster championship, three of them are on this platform which is basically a paywall. People are required to pay to see the national sport of hurling, which I am talking about in particular this morning.

The Cork county board raised this issue last Tuesday night. I understand there was a considerable debate at county board level about what we believe is happening. I believe this is fundamental. The GAA is a really important part of our society. We are all involved in it. I was the chairman of my local club for many years. I believe what is happening here is totally wrong. By putting in place a subscription paywall as a barrier for people to watch our national sport, we have taken it out of the control of the actual patrons who should be watching the game. They got this pay prescription in 2017 for overseas games. All of a sudden now, they have brought it in with RTÉ as a new way of raising revenue. The knock-on implication is that fewer people are seeing the games. I can quote such people as Dónal Óg Cusack, Tom Kenny and Mark Foley from Timoleague, GAA icons in my part of the world, who are vicious on social media about how this is having a huge impact on hurling in particular.

The Cathaoirleach on occasion has invited the president of the GAA into this Chamber and asked him to sit in that chair. I believe it is appropriate now that he should issue a new invitation for the GAA president to come forward and sit in that chair so that we can ask him about how he, as leader of an organisation of which the majority of us here are members, has allowed this to happen. This is wrong. I fundamentally believe we need to act really quickly on this. I am not asking for the Minister for sport to come in here because I do not believe she has the ability to do anything here. It is the president of the GAA who needs to come into this Chamber to outline his vision because at the moment, the pay-per-view barrier is killing our national sport.