The Government is set to decide next week if it will contribute to the stadium\u2019s rebuild.<\/p>\n
If it decides not to provide significant funding, Gordon Lyons said it will then be up to the GAA to make a decision on whether to progress with a revised and \u2018affordable\u2019 plan.<\/p>\n
The Government is due to issue its latest Spending Review on June 11. There has been no indication yet whether it will commit any funding to the Casement project.<\/p>\n
Mr Lyons said the \u00a362.5m promised by Stormont for the new stadium \u2018still stands\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve made it very, very clear as Sports Minister that I want to see more money for sports infrastructure in Northern Ireland,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we do need to do is make sure any additional funding for sport in Northern Ireland is done in a fair and equitable way.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think we had a fair and equitable basis for the funding of sport back in 2011 when the funding for Windsor and for Ravenhill and Casement was set out.<\/p>\n
\u201cI welcome additional funding for sport, but it should be done on a fair and on an equitable basis.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asked if the stadium rebuild would be \u2018dead in the water\u2019 should the Government refuse to add funding to that promised by Stormont and the Irish government on top of the \u00a315m set aside by the GAA he replied: \u201cUltimately it\u2019s up to the GAA, who are the lead on this project, to decide.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is \u00a362.5m there. As I\u2019ve said from the start, that funding stands. But as I\u2019ve also said before, if they (the GAA) don\u2019t have the money they need to look at ways to make this more affordable.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt would be incumbent on the GAA to look at the plans to see what it is they can afford, change those plans to suit the budget and work out how they want to proceed.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr Lyons was speaking as he addressed concerns over his own budget in the Communities department at Stormont.<\/p>\n
Plans for the 34,000-capacity stadium remain uncertain due to a major funding gap of around \u00a3150 million, with the overall cost of building the plans to an original design soaring to over \u00a3300m.<\/p>\n
Secretary of State Hilary Benn pulled the plug on ambitions of hosting Euro 2028 at Casement last September, saying costs had \u201crisen dramatically\u201d.<\/p>\n
In addition to the \u00a362.5 million committed by Stormont, the Irish Government has offered roughly \u00a342 million on top of the GAA\u2019s own contribution.<\/p>\n
Yesterday Finance Minister John O\u2019Dowd said he believed the UK government is in “solution-finding mode” when it comes to achieving the redevelopment of Casement Park.<\/p>\n
His upbeat assessment followed a meeting with Chief Secretary to the Treasury Darren Jones in London to discuss the Spending Review outcome.<\/p>\n
“I think I had a constructive meeting with the Treasury today and we covered the aspects of Casement Park and how important it is that Casement Park is delivered,” Mr O’Dowd said.<\/p>\n
“The Irish Government have announced their funding. The GAA have announced their funding. The Executive has announced its funding.<\/p>\n
“It’s now time for the British Government to announce theirs.<\/p>\n
“So, I think, in fairness to the Treasury, I am of the view that they’re now in solution-finding mode. If they continue in that mode, then I believe we can have a successful outcome to this.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Government is set to decide next week if it will contribute to the stadium\u2019s rebuild. If it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":152497,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5011],"tags":[6412,42497,6853,807,1144,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-152496","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-northern-ireland","8":"tag-casement-park","9":"tag-gordon-lyons","10":"tag-hilary-benn","11":"tag-keir-starmer","12":"tag-northern-ireland","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114614650991609451","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/152496","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=152496"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/152496\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/152497"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=152496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=152496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=152496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}