DERRY All-Ireland winner and TV pundit Joe Brolly has said he hopes something can be ‘sorted’ after the GAA For All Project came to an end with the loss of four coaching jobs.
Brolly was reacting after learning on Donegal Daily that Peace III funding for the programme came to an end on Friday – and no new funding had been found.
“We’ll get this sorted one way or another,” said the Dungiven man, who had written just last week on how the project had assisted in coaching young players from special needs schools who had played at half-time in the Ulster semi-final between Donegal and Derry in Cavan last week.
The project saw the coaches going into more than 40 schools to coach children in gaelic games. The programme reached out to members of the Protestant and new national communities and to children with special needs.
Paddy Mullen, one of those behind the project, didn’t contact Donegal Daily but did post comments on Facebook in which he admitted that Peace III funding had run out last Friday and that no new funding had, as yet, been found.
He said that he was “very disappointed” with the story on Donegal Daily on Sunday in relation to the job losses as funding had not been ‘axed’.
“The tender, which I assisted in submitting, was for a 12 month project which ended last Friday,” said Mullen.
“We are making efforts to try to find corporate sponsors and secure other funding which might allow us to run the project again from September but we cannot express enough our sincere thanks to the Peace III programme for awarding us the contract and allowing us to run such a successful project for the last 12 months.
“It is, of course, unfortunate that we cannot afford to continue the employment of the excellent coaches we had recruited for the project, but we do hope that we will be in a position to rehire them again in the months ahead.”
Brolly wrote about how the half-time display by teams from the Donegal Dynamos and St Bernadette’s would live long in his memory.
“On Wednesday, their last day at school before the summer holidays, all the boys and girls were presented with the photographs of the day,” said Joe.
“When the senior game is long forgotten, those extraordinary, joyous half time games will remain vivid in the memory.”
