SIPTU blasts FAI over ‘contemptuous’ redundancy plans

SIPTU has accused the Football Association of Ireland (FAI) of showing “utter contempt” for its staff after the organisation announced sweeping restructuring plans that could lead to compulsory redundancies, without giving employees clarity on their futures.

The union reacted with fury after the FAI confirmed it is beginning a “significant transformation programme” which includes a voluntary redundancy scheme, followed by redeployment and, if required, enforced job losses.

In a statement issued earlier today, the FAI said its board had signed off on changes aimed at modernising how football is developed and delivered across Ireland.

The Association said the overhaul would allow it to align with its long-term strategy, bring in specialist skillsets, drive financial sustainability, and ensure the game is developed at local, regional, national and international levels.

It insisted the programme had been informed by UEFA benchmarking and external consultants, and said it was necessary to create the “framework and skillsets” needed to deliver future plans, including the FAI Football Pathways Plan.

But SIPTU officials condemned both the process and the manner in which it was handled.

Adrian Kane, SIPTU Services Divisional Organiser, said:
“The FAI has shown utter contempt for its staff by outsourcing critical decisions about their futures to faceless consultants while failing to engage in any proper consultation process.

“This is an insult to the workers who have given their all to the organisation and to football in Ireland.

“The FAI has a duty to be transparent and accountable to its employees, yet it has kept them in the dark while threatening mass redundancies.”

He called on the FAI to immediately publish the number of jobs at risk and the criteria being used, saying:

“Workers have a right to know what is happening to their livelihoods and how these decisions are being made.

“The FAI has shown a total lack of respect for its employees, for our union, and for the wider footballing community.”

SIPTU Sector Organiser, Robert Purfield, added that staff were “deeply concerned” about their futures and questioned why external consultancy firms had been hired rather than direct engagement with employees.

“This type of decision-making is not only unprofessional, but undermines the very spirit of collaboration that is essential to the success of any footballing organisation,” he said.

Purfield also criticised the FAI’s focus on so-called “necessary skill sets” within its workforce, noting that many senior management figures had already departed under the current CEO.

“The question is: what are the necessary skill sets displayed by a CEO who, in recent months, has lost many of his senior management team and now hires unnamed external consultants to draft a plan he has yet to reveal to workers?

“There are also many questions for the FAI Board to answer,” he said.

He warned that grassroots football could be hit hardest by the restructuring, saying night leagues in disadvantaged areas and Football for All schemes for children with additional needs risk being undermined.

SIPTU members within the FAI are due to meet in the coming days to plan their response.