Cycling Ireland's delayed appearance before a Oireachtas committee to discuss the recent controversies within the national governing body is now due to go ahead tomorrow, Wednesday.
Officials from the federation will appear before the Joint Committee on Tourism, Culture, Arts, Sport and Media to discuss "governance and related issues within Cycling Ireland". Representatives from Sport Ireland were also set to appear before the committee during the same session, which was due to commence at 1.30pm.
The invitation to appear before the committee was first issued to Cycling Ireland five months ago in a process initiated by Ciaran Cannon TD (FG), who is a keen cyclist himself and has campaigned for cycling-safety measures.
At that time two controversies - which became conflated, but which are separate - were ongoing within Cycling Ireland.
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Firstly, the federation had applied for grants from the Department of Sport in 2020 using bogus quotations. When the issue came to light it was suspended for 12 months from receiving grant funding. However, that matter did not emerge until more than a year after the alarm was raised by an official within the Department of Sport.
Secondly, a major dispute broke out within Cycling Ireland over plans to fund an academy within the EvoPro Racing Continental team. While the heads of an agreement were drawn up at the end of last year, members of the Cycling Ireland board complained they had not been told and information had not been shared, despite a significant sum of money being involved.
The plan was eventually halted and since then a large number of board members have resigned and new members have been appointed. Several reviews have also been carried out into governance within Cycling Ireland. However, none of the findings of those reviews have been published and Cycling Ireland previously requested its appearance before the committee be postponed so one of the reports could first be completed.
The delay in appearing before the committee has meant Cycling Ireland has had time to put a number of reforms in place, working with Sport Ireland. It is likely officials from the federation will be keen to focus on that work in recent months when they face questions from TDs and senators tomorrow.
However, they are likely to face questions on the recent controversies, including the recent disharmony in the organisation, the bogus quotations it used in a bid to secure grant funding and also the debacle around the discontinued proposal to fund an academy within EvoPro Racing and the total costs of all of the reports and reviews.
