After 121 years, it only took the Camogie Association a little under half an hour to make history at Croke Park on Thursday night as 98 per cent of delegates at Special Congress backed a motion allowing players the choice of wearing shorts or skorts.
Less than three weeks after a protest by the Dublin and Kilkenny players over the ban on wearing shorts ignited a controversy on the issue, an overwhelming majority of the 133 delegates at Croke Park voted for change.
The whirlwind nature of the dispute moving from standoff to resolution means players are free to choose shorts or skorts immediately.
“We are pleased to announce that delegates have voted by an overwhelming majority in favour of giving players greater choice in their playing attire,” said Brian Molloy, president of the Camogie Association.
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“From midnight tonight each individual player will have the option to wear skorts or shorts – adding choice while maintaining the professionalism and uniformity of our team kits in both colour and design.
“I want to sincerely thank our incredible volunteers for their ongoing support over the last few weeks, and to our delegates for voting on behalf of over 120,000 members, including 94,000 playing members,” Molloy added.
The in-camera meeting started at 7.30pm on Thursday and media waiting in a separate room in Croke Park were informed shortly before 8pm that a result had been reached.
Molloy said 98 per cent of delegates voted in favour of the motion with just 2 per cent going against the proposal. The association added there was very little debate in the room before the ballot.
“I’d had conversations with the delegate chairs, the county chairs and provincial chairs over the last couple of weeks directly and they were all very focused on engaging with their members and taking time to poll them,” added Molloy.
“They were very focused on the importance of getting the players’ voice and making sure it was heard.
“For a lot of people that was the focus, that was the point of today, just to make sure that each one of those delegates then came in and reflected that in the vote.
“So, for many of them there’s nothing to say. We had a brief conversation, a brief chat as you can imagine, but it’s very positive up there (in the room), there was a very strong round of applause as soon as the vote was announced.
“People are very happy about this, people are very positive about this and the key piece, and I said it in the note that I issued out to the chairs two weeks ago I think at this stage, which was that we’re not getting rid of skorts. Tens of thousands of girls around the country enjoy playing camogie in skorts and tens of thousands of girls around the country would prefer to wear shorts, and that’s what we’ve now enabled.
“We’ve enabled that within our association and it’s a historic day for the association because it comes into effect from midnight tonight. I’m delighted that we’ve been able to achieve that so quickly.”
Similar motions were defeated at Congress only last year, though the key difference with this change is that it provides individual choice rather than a team-specific choice.
There were two votes at last year’s Congress – Tipperary’s proposal to replace the skort entirely with shorts was defeated with 64 per cent of delegates against such a change. Great Britain’s motion on including shorts as part of the playing uniform was also defeated with 45 per cent in favour but 55 per cent against.
The GPA welcomed the outcome of Thursday’s vote.
“The GPA would like to put on the record our admiration for camogie players across Ireland and beyond, both at inter-county and club level, who made their voices heard to ensure this outcome.
“To our own membership who have led the campaign for choice, we salute your willingness to stand up for both yourselves, and future generations of camogie players.
We thank the delegates who listened to players’ call for choice.
“The last few weeks have once again shown the necessity of putting players at the heart of decision making within Gaelic games.”
