Report recommends major overhaul at FAI as 78 proposals laid out - but no mention of John Delaney

The FAI could be left in a grave situation if they don't give the green light to a list of recommendations by the Governance Review Group.

This is the view of the group's chairman Aidan Horan after a list of 78 recommendations were made in a joint initiative agreed between the FAI and Sport Ireland.

It comes amid amid huge concerns over the finances and organisation of the body and what was termed today a "breakdown in trust, confidence and faith in the association".

Former chief executive John Delaney's €100,000 bridging loan to the FAI was the spark that engulfed the association into a crisis this year that eventually saw their funding from Sport Ireland suspended.

And the report recommends a limit of eight years for anyone serving on the FAI board, made up of two four-year terms,

It also suggests that the chief executive should not be a member of the board and that twice a year they have to report to the board on governance and compliance issues.

They propose a process for the board to evaluate the performance of the CEO after Delaney spent 14 years in the top role.

The 133-page document also called for the urgent need for a Audit, Risk and Compliance Committee after their financial controls have come under public criticism.

John Earley quit the FAI board earlier this week -  following the exits of former Honorary Secretary Michael Cody and Honorary Treasurer Eddie Murray - claiming he had “no other option’”.

Former FAI executive vice-president John Delaney (©INPHO/Laszlo Geczo)

And the report has recommended that a 12-person board should be formed at the 2020 AGM - made up of with four independent members, six members from the football community, the President and the Vice-President with the chairperson being one of the four independents.

The rest of the current board intend to step down ahead of the FAI AGM in Trim on July 27.

But the review does back the idea that some current board members could retain their roles as part of an interim board until the 2020 AGM.

They also have called for at least four of the 12 members to be women and for it to be a mandatory condition in two years time.

The report says: "There is need to clearly signal that involvement in football administration at a national level is not an almost exclusively male preserve."

Aidan Horan, chairman of the FAI governance review, admitted: "If this report cannot be delivered, and the recommendations not accepted, the FAI will be in a serious place and I don't think anyone wants that."

He added: "In our many meetings and presentations over recent weeks I have regularly emphasised that governance should not be seen as an end in itself but as a means to end.

"That end being, in the case of the FAI, the fulfilment of its overall purpose – the promotion and development of football in Ireland. All of the governance practices, policies, procedures, processes and the overall governance structures and arrangements should be directed with that overall purpose in mind.

"We have also unfortunately seen evidence of a breakdown in trust, confidence and faith in the association and this review is primarily focused on identifying and recommending actions and initiatives that, if implemented as envisaged, aim to rebuild and restore the trust, confidence and faith in how the association is governed.

"This report calls for serious reflection by those who have the authority and power to support and endorse these recommendations. This report also calls for a serious reflection by those who may see themselves taking on a governance position to acknowledge the profound duties and expectations that go with these roles."

FAI President Donal Conway (©INPHO/Ryan Byrne)

FAI President Donal Conway said: “We now have something we can talk about. This is the first serious piece of material we can talk about.

“We (FAI and Sport Ireland) both want to arrive at the same place and most of the time we agree on how that can be achieved.

“Governance has to be seen as a means to an end, it’s not the end itself.

“This is about rebuilding trust, confidence and faith in the association. Stakeholders of the game have been let down and that responsibility lies with the board.

“(This process) is about bringing the association to a far better place.

“Plan A is this governance review group report. There is no Plan B. This is what we have to achieve.

“I want this to be governance in practice, not just on paper. There are a lot of reports on dusty shelves. I don’t want it to be a report of that nature

“140 members out of 206 at the AGM are needed to adopt this report at the AGM. The FAI Board has adopted and endorsed this report in full.

Horan admitted there could be grave consequences if the recommendations of the report are not given the green light.

"If this report cannot be delivered, and the recommendations not accepted, the FAI will be in a serious place and I don't think anyone wants that."

Key recommendations of the report include the following:

• The six governance principles proposed by the Group should be adopted by the FAI Board as appropriate and relevant to the functioning of all facets of the Association, from clubs through to Board and Council. The six principles are: good governance, effective leadership, accountability and transparency, ethical behaviour and integrity, stakeholder engagement and professionalism
• All Board and committee members should receive formal induction training
• New and more comprehensive terms for the Board and committees should be developed
• Work clarifying the roles and responsibilities of the Chief Executive and other senior executives should be undertaken and reflected in an updated schedule of delegations from the Board to the executive
• The Chief Executive should not be a member of the Board
• The Board should undertake an annual review of its own effectiveness and that of its committees
• The Board are required to have and should prioritise the implementation of a comprehensive risk management system across the whole organisation
• The Board needs to ensure a robust culture of ‘holding to account’ operates and is seen to operate within the organisation
• As part of its work programme, the Board should consider and agree a process of evaluating the performance of the CEO. This process should be appropriate and transparent
• The Board should urgently establish an Audit, Risk and Compliance Committee
• The Association should immediately make arrangements for the establishment of an internal audit function
• While there is a Code of Conduct for Board members and staff, it is recommended that a similar code be provided to committee members, council members and to contractors and agents working for and on behalf of the Assocation
• All grant of funding arrangements above a defined threshold, e.g. €10,000, should be presented to the Board for review and approval
• A Certificate of Compliance, signed by the Chief Executive and Finance Director, should be presented confirming that all governance, compliance and statutory conditions attaching to such external third-party grant or funding agreements have been fully complied with
• A Register of Funding Sources should be established to record and monitor all external funding to the Association to be reviewed by the Board, or delegated Board Committee, on a bi-annual basis
• All funding agreements should be proposed to the Board, irrespective of any agreed thresholds or approval processes
• The Chief Executive should present a bi-annual report to the Board confirming that all of the governance and compliance requirements of any service level agreement entered into between the FAI and Third Parties have been met and that funding is used solely for the purposes included in the original approval
• The annual presentation of the year end accounts to the Board for approval should include a schedule of all new commitments assumed by the Association over the preceding 12-month period and a projection of the funding requirements for the coming 12 months with particular reference to the likelihood of a requirement to assume further significant financial obligations above those currently pertaining
• The composition of the Board should include independent Directors of whom one would act as Chairperson of the Board
• The Board should consist of 12 members: four independent Directors of whom one would be the Chairperson of the Board, the President, Vice-President and six members representative of the football community
• The positions of Honorary Secretary and Honorary Treasurer should not be part of the revised structure and should cease to exist
• There should be a minimum 33.3% of both genders within 24 months
• It should be an objective of the Association that this gender balance can also be reflected at Council, Committee and AGM level and this should be achieved within three years
• The election of the President and Vice-President should be done at the AGM
• Council should continue to be the body to elect from its membership the footballing representatives to the Board
• The six Board members coming from the football community be elected using a four-constituency model
• A Nominations Committee be formed by the Board to select candidates for election as independent Directors
• The limit for all members of the Board should be eight years, 4x2 year terms.
• There should be a maximum term limit of 10 years for members of Council        
• The Board committees should be restructured so that the Board is supported by a number of committees, some of which will support the Board in the business elements of their role and some of which will support the Board in the football elements of their role
• There will also be a Football Management Committee with a specific brief in the area of football matters and whose membership will include the chairpersons of the Football Committees
• The representative imbalance in the current makeup of Council be addressed by provision for a further 21 positions which would see the Council with a membership of 79
• Given the exceptional circumstances in which the FAI finds itself now and, more importantly, to start the process of rebuilding trust, faith and confidence in the Association and to progress the further work required, the group are recommending the appointment of an interim Board for a period up to the AGM in July 2020. This new Board would be appointed in accordance with the structures proposed in the report
• In April 2019, the full Board of the FAI signalled their intention to resign and step down at the next AGM and the Group respect that this is the position
• In acknowledging the exceptional circumstances that exist, and the many calls for a complete change at the top, the Group considers that, for handover and transition purposes and to manage the serious risks where everyone leaves at once, at least one or possibly a maximum of two members might consider putting themselves forward for positions on the interim Board. This will require the current Board, as a collective, to consider their individual and personal interests but more importantly at this stage consider the interests of the Association and decide what they, as a collective, consider is the best course of action

Read the full report here:

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