{"id":694679,"date":"2026-01-14T05:06:19","date_gmt":"2026-01-14T05:06:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/694679\/"},"modified":"2026-01-14T05:06:19","modified_gmt":"2026-01-14T05:06:19","slug":"ulster-banner-to-remain-ni-flag-for-commonwealth-games-following-guidance-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/694679\/","title":{"rendered":"Ulster Banner to remain NI flag for Commonwealth Games following guidance \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Ulster Banner will continue to be used by the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/northern-ireland\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/northern-ireland\">Northern Ireland<\/a> team at the Commonwealth Games following Stormont ministerial guidance.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">It comes after a suggestion that Commonwealth Games Northern Ireland (CGNI) would use the CGNI corporate logo at the 2026 games in Glasgow in the continued absence of guidance from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/stormont-assembly\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/stormont-assembly\">Stormont<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">In a statement on Tuesday evening, CGNI said they had been asking Stormont since November 2020 for guidance regarding which flags should be flown at the Commonwealth Games.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">They said following \u201cextensive media coverage on Monday\u201d,  the North\u2019s Minister for Communities Gordon Lyons \u201cprovided such guidance\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cThe Minister for Communities, who holds the portfolio for sports, offered \u2018clear and unequivocal guidance\u2019 and stated \u2018For the avoidance of doubt, and to reiterate on the guidance which you have sought, the Ulster Banner should be used as the flag for Northern Ireland athletes at the Commonwealth Games\u2019.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cWe note this guidance which will be implemented.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">They added: \u201cThe CGNI Board and member sports are representative of the wider Northern Ireland community. We will continue to promote equality, diversity and inclusion in all we do, in line with our motto, One Community, One Team.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Mr Lyons said CGNI \u201cmade the right decision this evening\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cNow is the time to focus on supporting our incredible athletes,\u201d he added in a post on the social media network X.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Earlier, Mr Lyons said he would explore whether he has the power to enforce the use of the Ulster Banner as the Northern Ireland flag at the Commonwealth Games. \u2013 PA<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Ulster Banner will continue to be used by the Northern Ireland team at the Commonwealth Games following&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":694680,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5011],"tags":[1144,28984,16,15],"class_list":["post-694679","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-northern-ireland","tag-northern-ireland","tag-stormont-assembly","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115891718364555027","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694679","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=694679"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694679\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/694680"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=694679"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=694679"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=694679"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}