The Minister of State for Sport and Physical Education, Thomas Byrne TD, will convene a meeting today with the leading executives in sport with the purpose of addressing how best to tackle incidents of racism and violence in sport.
Minister Byrne will meet with the leaders of Ireland’s three largest sporting organisations (the GAA, FAI and IRFU) and will be joined by Dr Una May, CEO of Sport Ireland.
Minister Byrne said: “As a sporting community, it is imperative that we demonstrate that there is simply no place for violence and racism in sport. Sport fosters a great sense of belonging in our communities and we must never allow incidents of racism and violence to undermine the positive power of sport.”
“I look forward to meeting with some of the leading executives in sport today to discuss how we can best prevent incidents of racism and violence from occurring in sport and to consider, how we can best address such incidents, when they unfortunately occur.”
It comes after Wexford hurling star Lee Chin suffered racial abuse at a charity match last month, in an incident that was widely condemned.
A number of incidents involving attacks on referees have also been highlighted recently; Government officials began discussions with Sport Ireland earlier this year on how to tackle such behaviour.