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THE UK GOVERNMENT announced yesterday evening that it will not pay towards funding the redevelopment of Casement Park in time for the Euros in 2028.
It was confirmed last October by Uefa that Ireland and UK would host the championship together, with the redeveloped Casement Park in Belfast named as one of ten venues chosen for games – but the level of funding necessary to rebuild the stadium in time is still not confirmed.
The UK’s Northern Ireland Secretary said the decision was based on what they believe to be “a significant risk that it would not be built in time”.
That’s despite the Irish government and GAA previously promising to contribute towards the redevelopment.
Today, we’re asking you: Do you think the UK government should provide the necessary funding for the redevelopment of Casement Park ahead of the Euros in 2028?
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No, waste of money, plenty of great stadiums in Ireland and the UK, no point pumping money into a unionist farmer stadium
@qffaffaf affrafrfraf: Uneducated troll comment, you obviously confused Casement Oark with Windsor Park. You are some clown
@qffaffaf affrafrfraf: Please do not feed the troll and his inane ramblings, qffaffaf is a well known troll on this app. He will reap what he sowed.
@qffaffaf affrafrfraf: are u taring yourself a new one or summit
@qffaffaf affrafrfraf: are you not answering yourself there man, whatever your on could I get some, for a friend
@qffaffaf affrafrfraf: I always knew you were a troll but arguing with yourself.
Lay off the chemicals lad.
@qffaffaf affrafrfraf: jeez, did ya forget to change account? LMAO.
@Kevin Dillon: Exactly, forgot to switch, multiple accounts, in fairness they are made fairly obvious & the content is usually the same, with similar trolling lines. Then you have the profiles who are obviously backed by Govt, akin to Leo Varadkar’s Spin Dept, maybe some of them are from that, they answer or support points made by one profile, we all know who they are, they are employed to control the narrative online. Eventually these Shills will be replaced by AI, which would be ironic. Some ex RTE individuals as well in the above category. Eventually they will end Free Speech in Ireland & everything will be by Govt Dictat, controlling what people read or hear. RTE is currently nothing but the propaganda wing of the current FFG Govt, nobody believes any of them, trust has evaporated.
@qffaffaf affrafrfraf: Did you forget to log out of your other account? Simpleton
@qffaffaf affrafrfraf:
Are ya alright there Eoghan?
Up to the ole multiple accounts seonín hijinks and eejitry again, ….Harris?
On the bright side, if Casement Park is not used for the Euros then NI won’t get one of the host spots ahead of us
As long as it is only the British Pound paying I don’t mind if it is redeveloped. The Brits are not lining up to pay for sporting infrastructure south of the border. Either way I am not bothered of it happens or not.
If the people of Northern Ireland wish for the stadium to be redevloped then they should raise local taxes to pay for it, there was no way a UK government was going to pay for a private stadium in the same week they cut the heating allowance of pensioners (and we shouldn’t be paying for it either).
Shame SF and then DUP needlessly shutdown Stormont for years.
@Pat Hazzard: it was DUP.
Can’t blame SF for that
@Pat Hazzard: pity someone couldn’t shut you down
@Pat Hazzard: second time you’ve made this comment, and second time you’ve left out the DUP RHI scandal which gave their friends hundreds of millions. Ofcourse, it isn’t related to Sinn Féin so it’s not worth mentioning
@Fergus O’Donnell: SF shutdown Stormont from 2017 to 2020. Isn’t that rather too recent for the Shinners to be attempting to rewrite history again ?
@Eoin .h: Usual Provo propaganda that omits the fact the Shinners themselves pushed the scheme
@Pat Hazzard: did they yeah? And are Sinn Féin in the room with us now?
The block grant to NI from the UK government is just under £15 billion this year.
@honey badger: The north has never been treated as an equal part of the UK by the British. They can spend billions supporting war and genocide but yet 2 million of their citizens are being fed in modern day soup kitchens.
@Anthony Curran: the North costs the UK financially.it does not pay for its own existence. As it won’t pay for itself if it ever becomes part of the republic. To many people with extreme and intolerant views up there(on both sides of their silly fence)
I only hope,hope, hope that our fine leaders in Leinster House don’t decide to offer more money out of our recently received Corp Tax billions.
Considering the UK government can not fund the winter payments for their old age pensioners, the NHS is on the brink of collapsing and their economy is in recession, then the last thing on their list will be funding a derelict sports park.
@Eileen Kelly: Yet they spend billions every year on war and support the genocide of the Palestinian people! Go figure!
@Anthony Curran: Starting a war they can’t possibly win was absolutely reckless!
@Eileen Kelly: That “derelict sports park” undergoing major re-construction would create an absolute stampede of jobs for broke Britons
…..under Northern Irish Construction Firm Managers.
And that is a means of getting their economy back on its feet.
Money in pockets causes money to circulatate inside the internal economy thus keeping the economy on life-support (at worst), or driving the economy forward and upward (at best).
NI doesn’t figure in the thoughts of the vast majority of the rest of the UK unless there’s something huge happening. With money so tight it’s no surprise they see little reward in funding this. The vast majority of the electorate is in one country that absolutely dominates the Union. If they really wanted to get the stadium ready for 2028 they could. I’m not saying it’s right, just political gravity that the extremely noisy English papers and electorate will take priority here. That money can be used to try and pacify some of them.
Casement Park or another venue, if it’s in Northern Ireland, they must pay, otherwise, hand it over.
Anything is possible with determination Monsignor James Horan Builds Knock Airport 1981, and the gaa and British and Irish government have more money than he ever had
Childish unionism strikes again.
£400m to upgrade a stadium that probably won’t be ready for the Euros and would be under-utilised after. No thanks
@Mick Duvanny: It definitely wouldn’t be under-utilised. If it is being rebuilt for Euros, then it is *not* intended to be exclusively a GAA venue thereafter, but rather a dual or multisport venue.
And since it is *Casement* Park, it could & should also incorporate a Sir Roger Casement CMG – Colonial Service Unionist, also Irish Nationalist, also Humanitarianist – Museum.
Just as GAA has a GAA Museum at GAA HQ in Croker…
So too can Casement Park host a permanent museum of its Anglo-Irish, Protestant-Catholic, Unionist-Nationalist, namesake.
I think the Irish Government should pay for it out of the 13 billion tax rebate. After all it will be all Ireland in a few years time.
@Colm Molloy: over my dead body, be a civil war in the morning, this romanticism of a united ireland is a dream, Westminster is supplementing billions into civil servant jobs in the north, Westminster would get rid of the north in the morning
They should fund the Irish team instead, show em how its done.
Wrong question! What about the option of should the Irish Government fund it with the GAA. This issue is being used as a secatarian tool of hate and division. If loyalists want to act so childishly and Downing Street pander to them, ignore them and push on regardless. If they wanna live in a dive, the rest of us should have an option, not to.
Why in God’s name should the GAA get another free stadium? The 50 million quid that our government is willing to stump up, would do up all the League of Ireland grounds instead.
@ashling doyle: So you want to give 50 million quid to the FAI, those bastions of efficiency and competency? I can see that going well! Lol
As long as Bam are accepted tenders it will be completed on time.
@Thomas Anthony McMillan:
Wait. Whaaaat!!?
Damn, I mis-read and “liked” that before I realised it did not say:
“As long as BAM are accepted tenders it will NOT* be completed on-time”.
Yes….. Absolutely…..The people of Northern Ireland have suffered for long enough and now is their time for something good…..
“Her killing was condemned by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken”.
Yeah, with US-supplied weapons.
Just to put it into perspective our government is putting a cricket stadium into Abbotstown, delivered for 2030, Casement capacity will be nearly 9 times as much.
Yes, they owe the Catholic community and indeed the island as a whole reparations.
@Niall Costello: what a jokestop get over it
It would been better to build an new stadium that wouldn’t offend the divide, outside the Belfast.
@Paul Maguire: You mean like the Maze project, which would’ve been built 10 yeats ago but for unionist stubbornness, intransigence and basic sectarianism?
@Paul Maguire: It’s all a political football up there no matter where it is.
@Paul Maguire:
Sir Roger Casement *was* a Unionist.
And a Royalist.
And a member of the Colonial Service.
Franky it is bizarre that either “side” could hold a disposition that would be 100% for, or 100% against, him, the idea of him, or a namesake Stadium.
(A Stadium that could, potentially, memorialise him with a dedicated Museum noting the complexity, yet simplicity, of his existence. And his allegiances to both “sides”, but in the end simply allegiance to *humanity* itself).
The UK government stopped paying winter fuel allowance to o.a.p,s in UK you think the Irish government wouldn’t do same here in Ireland think again
The Republic should fund it abd the GAA chip in too. Soon it will be ours anyway.
@Michael O’Carroll: How soon exactly? Come on Michael enlighten us all on where you got this information from.
Even if the Irish government does pony up more the schedule is very tight as work would need to be finished by summer 2027 as UEFA demands that all tournament venues must be ready a year before the action starts for “essential test events”.
@Pat Barry:
If they were to establish the potential cross-community cultural and historical, as well as sporting, importance of a Stadium who’s namesake was both a Unionist Royalist *and” a Nationalist (and whom would be marked with an incorporated Museum at the Stadium, albeit likely that component would be completed after the League Final) – maybe they could ask for special consideration of flexibility with the schedule if it really is within a whisker of completion by the League’s usual deadline.
i do not think that the irish government should pay out for the refurbrishment of Casement Park which is located in Northern Ireland in a sectarian area of Belfast..The GAA is sectarian and the money saved by the Irish Government should be used to provide housing for the homeless.The Irish Government must be reminded of the following
(A) the GAA patron is the RC
Archbishop of Cashel (B) GAA games are only pl;ayed in RC colleges and schools.(C) two of the GAA cups are named after cardinals (D) a number of stadiums in the Republic are named after bishops.
No other sport is played along sectarian lines.
Do them Unionists in N. Ireland now see that their loyalty pays that London doesn’t care about you but Dublin has an interest but this will be shot down with annoyance.
I’m sure if Dublin showed an interest in building this project, Surely we could get funding from the European Investment Bank/ Trust under the peace and infrastructure fund?
No. Time to think outside the box. Build a National Stadium in Derry instead. They would appreciate it more. Could do with the investment. Dublin Belfast for everything is boring now
Both the Irish Government and the GAA are in favour of Irish Unity, the GAA isn’t sectarian anymore, the current GAA President Jarlath Burns fosters the ethos of showing in the organisation that it has sympathy and an understanding for the culture of the Protestant people in Northern Ireland so when we ask them to respect our culture, maybe they will.
Wasn’t long ago when the GAA wouldn’t even allow soccer to be played on a GAA pitch. Now, not only do they want a stadium for the Euros, but they want the British government to pay for it?
@Colm de Cleir: That’s because the stadium is in NI.
Rugby Union doesn’t allow Rugby League to use it’s grounds to this day. That’s why Leagues biggest day is played at Wembley.
@Colm de Cleir:
They definitely still shouldn’t.
If for no other reason than rendering a would-be Stadium like Casement to be the cross-community and cross-cultural exception to the rule.
If the UK rebuilds it, they will come to the field of dreams
The little englanders would cut off thier nose out off spite for it’s face
The UK government is struggling to make ends meet.
Schools are crumbling, NHS is under funded. Their national debt is enormous as they are spending more servicing it than several government departments. They have to pay compensation for the blood scandal and postmaster scandal. They are receiving less in tax than they are spending.
Hence they are cutting some things.
@Tommy Mullally: Keir Stamer warned last year that Poland would overtake the UK economically by 2030 if growth trends continued.
@Tommy Mullally:
They are not banjaxed from lack of Monetary Capital.
They are banjaxed solely from Tory Policies of profound neglect of Public Services & Infrastructure.
Something which Tories love to do, regardless of the Economic State of their Country. Tories drive Public Funded Public Services into the ground in order to either Manufacture a Crisis requiring Tendering Contracts with Private Firms (their buddies, or themselves via a Shell Company) and/or just straight up force complete Privatisation of a sector.
*City of London* has plenty enough Capital.
And both them, and plenty more besides like Raab&Gove et al, benefited massively from *their premeditated* Russo-Brexit agenda.
Although Brexit has certainly damaged the Economic stability for everyone else.
(What’s new!)
But rebuilding a project like Casement would put money back into pockets of British Tradies & Labourers, as much as NI Tradies & Labourers. And money in pockets that return to Nth Engerlund or Wales every night, would *Jump-Start* their economy by creating an internal circulation of liquid cash.
Uefa will just pile in & bail the whole bloody thing out closer to the cut off point, wait & see
I would imagine that the host stadium will that should have been Casement Park will be Murrayfield in Edinburgh. You cannot have 2 host stadiums in the same city so that would rule out Dublin and Glasgow.
@Karl Gallagher: If Casement isn’t ready, then the games due to be played there go to Leeds.
This country is awash with money and the UK are headed for a recession so tell how this makes sense please. If the irish government aren’t getting behind it then why the hell bother.
@Gavin Smartr: The Irish Government have pledged 50 Million to the project, and the GAA 15 Million.
So since Britain *chose* to annex and keep Northern Ireland under their jurisdiction, obviously they are well overdue making significant contributions to its post-War Recovery and Rejuvenation.
Perhaps, since GAA are allowing Casement to be a dual sport Stadium with Soccer *and* willing to host a major European Soccer League – the British FA could also contribute.
If they are so “afeared” of not completing it ontime.
Then comission a radically different method of Public Capital Construction.
Don’t do it “the British way” AND don’t do it “the Irish way” either.
Afterall, Britain *has* left the EU.
So with all regard and conformity to SAFETY Regulations…
Just hire a radical *team* of “schedulers” who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for coordinating Tradesmen, efficiency of build, *accurate* ordering of materials, timing of arrivals of materials on-site, *AND* still managing to meet all Safety Regulations (to date!) as well as the deadline for completion.
Really, deadline is all about a truly elite *Scheduler* of large public construction projects.
Definitely don’t hire BAM.
And definitely don’t hire ANY Americans.
(Maybe try Australia, NZ, Germany, Emirates)
- Rather than “Tendering” for a single Contractor.
Let several bidders each take a run at a stand each in the Stadium.
- Maybe use Concrete 3D Printing to speed up the build?
- Definitely deploy AI as an aid to communicate with all Contractors so there are no delays between Plumbers and Electricians, or Roofers and Plasterers etc.
- Create an AI “Handover Book” as a reference and scheduler for ALL Tradies.
- Create AI and graphics programs for all Tradies to prepare both orders and action plans so that they are ready to go, without questions or delays, as soon as the trade preceding them is finished.
This isn’t just about hosting the Euros.
Nor is it solely about a GAA grounds either.
It isn’t about Nationalist favouritism.
Nor is it about Unionist resource or economic disadvantage either.
This isn’t even about a GAA grounds providing a *rare* opening of its doors not only to a foreign sport (soccer), but also potentially to *English* (or more generally *British*) teams.
This is one of the greatest cross-community cultural and sporting opportunities both Britain, and Ireland, both Unionist and Nationalist, might ever have had.
There could not be anything more profoundly important and uniquely pertinent to BOTH communities of Northern Ireland.
Yet none seem to have realised it yet.
None have grasped that this stadium can, and should, be far more than “just” a stadium of two sports.
Casement Park is an opportunity to embody and celebrate a namesake historic figure – pertinent to all three jurisdictions – who could not be more a personification of Ulster, its conflicting communities & ideologies, Royalism, Unionism, Nationalism, and above all *Humanitarianism*.
Casement may have *become* an Irish Nationalist.
But there is no denying he was a through and through Colonial Service Royalist and Loyalist for the majority of his life.
And well awarded and medalled as such.
Indeed, before he became an Irish Nationalist, he naturally had to be a Dissident Unionist too.
A Protestant Father.
A Catholic Mother.
A Liverpudlian, a Dubliner *and* a son of Antrim.
A not insignificant contributor to *British* Parliamentary reports on various Colonial Atrocities against various indigenous populations
Casement Park has an opportunity to also be a museum of&about Roger Casement himself.
Of & about the complex conflict of so many Anglo-Irish throughout this island’s history who held both Royalism/Unionism AND Irish Nationalism/Republicanism in high regard in equal…or almost equal…measure at different, or sometimes the precise same, time in their lives.
Frankly, there realy could be nothing more symbolic to Northern Ireland and the Peace Process than the reformation and rejuvenation of a stadium with such a *universally* and “Internationally* impactful namesake.
As British and Royalist as the CMG that he was awarded, and stripped of, may be – let the Stadium stand in neutrality and unity for:
“Auspicium Melioris Aevi”
Let the Stadium be – “Token of a Better Age”!!!
@Pink Freud: Unionists regard Roger Casement as a convicted traitor, which, like it or not, is legally correct. Perhaps if the stadium was renamed for John Hume or Paddy Devlin, other things might follow?
Write a blank check and it still wouldn’t be enough. Investing vast amount of public money for a football match is obscene.
How about a “No, we don’t want or need their invader money.” option?
My twitter feed is clogged with posts from “republicans” who are hopping mad that British money is not being given to develop a GAA stadium for use in a soccer tournament. Utter hypocrisy.
have your say