Dundrod Club chairman says failed attempts to obtain insurance policy was major factor in cancellation of Ulster Grand Prix

Robert Graham said several requests had been made to the sport’s governing body, the MCUI (Ulster Centre), for a copy of the policy, which had proved fruitless.

The Ulster Centre’s chairman, John Dillon, said that ‘insurance documents with extensive details of cover’ had been issued to the Dundrod club four weeks ago.

In response, Mr Graham said that while the Dundrod club did receive ‘various documents’, no copy of the full policy had been obtained, and on that basis no decision could be made to run the event, which was scheduled to take place in August.

“In the statement from the MCUI chairman, he has confirmed that we did not get the actual policy, despite the numerous requests made,” Mr Graham said.

“He has said that we got various documents, which we did, but we did not get the policy. Therefore, we don’t know what is in the policy – what we’re insured for or not insured for – and I was advised as club chairman not to take the policy on if we did not see it.

“That’s why we’re not going, there’s no other reason. We worked very hard in the background and we were ready to go, but we have funds sitting for next year and that’s how we’re going to keep it,” he added.

“We haven’t given up hope that the Ulster Grand Prix will run again in the future. We have some very determined members within our club and we hoped to run this year, but if you don’t see the policy, you don’t go, so I took the good advice from our solicitor.”

The club previously said the issue had been ‘compounded further’ by ‘ongoing uncertainty around funding for the event from Tourism NI’, claiming there had been no indication relating to whether or not an application for funding had been successful, or ‘what level of support the UGP might be eligible to receive’.

Addressing the club’s statement last month, Tourism NI said approval was in place to provide funding once two issues had been ‘addressed satisfactorily’, including clarification on insurance cover and financial viability.