Mick, I certainly wouldn't include you or ard mhacha in that characterisation - sorry if I implied otherwise!

If it's useful for anyone as far as credibility, I'm certainly not claiming to be just a Dublin musician. I'm employed part-time at the moment by Comhaltas - I designed and am the webmaster of http://comhaltas.ie. My authority isn't in the area of PR, but since no-one was speaking out and I happened to know a lot about the controversy, I'm posting kinda on my own. No-one asked me to post; but then as the "tech guy" around the office, I'm one of the few who's aware of the Internet.

I don't mind if people criticise Comhaltas or the actions of its officers or officials -- I spend plenty of time doing that myself. But before we can get into motivations, it seemed that there was/is an awful lot of misinformation (bred and reinforced by mistrust) out there.

I'm posting on my own time (and neglecting my studies!), but also chatting casually to staff and elected representatives who I happen to know. I've been in the room at Head Office when a lot of this went down over the past year, though (again) it's not really in my area. I designed some killer sound and light systems for the new Clasac theatre, and I can't wait to work some shows in there. I enjoy meeting the members of Cluain Tarbh at the Dublin Fleadh and at the Fleadh Cheoil, though my own branch is different one in Dublin.

Anyway, to refer to the very first post, where Jim says:

"It would appear that the leadership of CCE has taken over the premises which was built with money raised by the local branch, and has expelled the branch in order to finalise the dirty deed."

There's a lot there that's simply not true. It's not Jim's fault - he heard it on the radio, and then read Cluain Tarbh's website. But the leadership of CCÉ haven't taken over anything -- it always was a Comhaltas-owned building. Money wasn't raised mostly by the branch - the local branch raised about 2% of the money. The branch wasn't expelled to finalise the takeover of a theatre - Comhaltas' high council suspended and then dissolved the executive committee of the branch, because the project was in jeopardy and a year of negotiations hadn't resolved it. And fortunately, the branch executive has re-formed itself quickly with an experienced committee.

Personally, I think that the branch members should have been kept better-informed of the money issues. I also think that the branch shouldn't have let the theatre committee be run by the branch executive. I also personally wish that there had been another way to get the project back on track, and I wholeheartedly agree that the mechanisms of communication and public relations (even when talking to the branch) were severely neglected by Comhaltas leadership. Doesn't mean it was a mean-spirited greedy power-grab, though.

Anyway, those are the facts. I think that it might be quite productive to discuss funding or politics in arts-based non-profits. State sponsorship of traditional arts raises all sorts of interesting issues of governance and representation. It's also interesting to speculate on the Ardchomhairle debate. But none of that can be done meaningfully when people don't know what's going on.