The Olympic Federation of Ireland has taken two specific steps during the past six months under the GAMES national action plan:

1) The OFI staff group has undergone a first session of Gender Equality and Diversity awareness training with the Irish Centre for Diversity in March 2024. A second session is scheduled for staff on 28 January 2025.

2) Over the course of three meetings, we have agreed to update our maternity policy within the staff handbook to move from statutory benefits to provide full pay equivalent. Research was carried out within the sports sector on comparatives and it was found that the sports sector as a whole is generally behind other private and public sector businesses in this regard. Only the largest and best funded NFs are offering maternity benefit equivalent to full pay. It was agreed that as the National Olympic Committee with a responsibility to lead in the sector, we should move to offer 100% maternity leave benefits to employees.

As part of the process, we discussed with the Government agency the idea of a fund for smaller NFs to support those which are trying to provide similar benefits for female employees and will keep this under review.

The GAMES project was a 24-month project co-funded by the European Union through the Erasmus+ Sport Programme 2021 and coordinated by the EOC EU Office. It promotes integrity and good governance in sports by advocating for structural and cultural changes regarding gender equality in leadership and decision-making positions among NOCs and their member federations. The EOC EU Office is implementing GAMES together with 8 NOCs (Belgium, Czech Republic, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Latvia, North Macedonia and Turkiye) and renowned experts in the field of gender equality and good governance, including Professor Emerita Kari Fasting from Equal Rights in Sports and I Trust Sport. Furthermore, the GAMES project is supported by the International Olympic Committee.