Debate contribution: Casement Park: Non-GAA Events

Debate contribution by Mr Timothy Gaston on 17 February 2026.

MLA

Mr Timothy Gaston

Party at the time

Traditional Unionist Voice

Date

17 February 2026

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Casement Park: Non-GAA Events

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5394368

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I beg to move

Thank you very much, Madam Principal Deputy Speaker. I make no secret of the fact that, if Casement Park is built, you will never see me in the stands. I have profound issues with the GAA. Many people in my community share those concerns. When they hear of Casement Park, they do not recall some sporting feat. They remember the murders of Corporals Derek Wood and David Howes. They think of a sport that names clubs after the likes of Kevin Lynch, an INLA terrorist who went to jail not for encouraging fitness but for kneecapping people, denying them the ability to walk. However, this is not a debate about whether Casement Park should exist. It is not a debate about the place of the GAA. It is not a debate about sport, identity or culture. It is a debate about something far more basic: public money, private profit and whether the Northern Ireland taxpayer is to be treated as an unlimited underwriter of a major commercial venue with no share in return. The Strategic Investment Board (SIB) describes Casement as a flagship capital project — a new stadium with a capacity of around 34,500 and that includes corporate hospitality, conferencing and extensive year-round facilities. That is not simply a sports ground redevelopment; it is a major commercial venue. The motion recognises what everyone now accepts:

"that the stadium will host major non-GAA commercial events, including international concerts and sporting fixtures, generating substantial private revenue".

The question, therefore, is not whether money will be made; the question is who will benefit from it. The scale of public funding is enormous and still growing. The project sits within the Executive's regional stadia programme. The Executive endorsed a package of up to £110 million under that programme. Stormont committed £62·5 million as far back as 2011. Now, Westminster has added a further £50 million through financial transactions capital (FTC). The Minister of Finance told the Assembly that that funding could be used only for Casement, that it does not need to be repaid to Treasury and that it comes with no further conditions attached. Public exposure increases, yet there remains no enforceable mechanism to ensure that the taxpayer sees any return. Furthermore, the project is still priced at around £100 million more than the current money available. Therefore, this question becomes unavoidable: if there is a gap, who is expected to close it? The answer, time and time again, is the public purse. Going beyond that, let us look at the issue of revenue. The Casement Park project literature states:

"revenues created ... on match days and throughout the year will be reinvested back into the GAA community".

Revenues are expected. The question is simply this: why should the taxpayer get nothing back when the taxpayer paid so much in?

The motion is not radical: clawback is a standard tool of public finance. The Scottish Government's public finance manual includes charge and clawback conditions as routine safeguards where public funding creates assets capable of generating a return. That is orthodox value-for-money discipline. In 2009, for example, the Scottish Funding Council clawed back £2·88 million from Stow College, which was repaid over several years. We have other real-world precedents. For example, in London, when the publicly funded Olympic stadium was converted for commercial use, the public authority retained a contractual right to share in key commercial income streams, such as naming rights and hospitality revenues. The taxpayer was not left paying the bill while others kept the upside. That is exactly the principle in the motion that I have proposed. The National Audit Office and the Public Accounts Committee have warned that the Government too often fail to maximise long-term value from major projects. They stress that it is not enough to build an asset; rather, mechanisms must exist to ensure that the intended public value is realised. The motion is not about opposing Casement but about protecting the taxpayer. The amendment, while well-intentioned in its desire to safeguard public investment, ultimately falls short. In referring to current and future constructions, it fails to distinguish between current and future budget provision. It therefore treats budgets that are already allocated and agreed as if they were no different from hypothetical future schemes. That lack of clarity would negatively affect organisations that have already designed business cases for current Stormont-led programmes, having acted in good faith, followed the rules and secured approvals on the basis of criteria that the Departments set. Many current projects have already negotiated funding packages, revenue models and community benefit obligations tailored to their circumstances. I make it clear that the motion relates to moneys not yet planned, allocated or, in the case of Casement, talked up at Executive level, and therefore it provides a clear line in the sand. Unfortunately, the amendment does not make that clear, and, for that reason, I cannot support it. The proposition is simple: if public money underwrites that stadium and fills the gap, and if non-GAA concerts and fixtures generate substantial commercial profit, it is totally unacceptable and unjustifiable for the public to carry the cost while private bodies retain the reward. That is why we call for a legally enforceable clawback mechanism as a condition of any further public funding in order to return an agreed proportion of net revenues from non-GAA events to the public purse. The motion calls for fairness, value for money and basic accountability to the taxpayer. I commend it to the House and look forward to the debate.

924 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 14:51 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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