We should keep England and the home nations for the World Cup, 4 Nations and a European Five Nations but use GB and Ireland Lions for tours.
The argument that Ireland, Scotland and Wales don’t produce the players is circular. They never will have the numbers if eligible players have to opt to play for England for top international experience. But providing an incentive in the form of the Lions gives heritage and home grown players the chance to play for their home nation and still represent GB&I.

Does Aussie Rules worry about a World Cup? Does Gaelic football? Of course not. If they had one then Australia and Ireland respectively would win them at a canter demolishing a few countries with heritage players who had Australian or Irish accents. Those are the kind of sports rugby league is on a level with. Not rugby union, not cricket and certainly not football. I'm deliberately leaving the big American sports out of it because there is huge money in those sports, but they obviously don't have World Cups either.

I'm not saying RL shouldn't have a World Cup, but the "home nations" just pad it out and make up numbers. That would be fine if the players were from those countries, and the general public there were glued to their tellies hoping for an upset when they play, but that isn't the case. I'd prefer an eight, or even six, team World Cup if need be than an excessive number of pointless teams.

Keeping the home nations as developmental sides and GB+I as the Test side also removes the ridiculous option of a player playing for either Scotland, Wales or Ireland then going on to play for England once they're good enough to make the team, or vice versa once they drop out of England contention. You can naturally play for any of those sides and also play for GB+I at Test level. Obviously far fetched, but if an option ever came about to get RL into the Olympics (personally I would prefer this to a World Cup, but realise many would disagree) them it would have to be part of Team GB anyway. That would remove Ireland admittedly, but off the top of my head there's only Brian Carney who would have been affected in the 25 years I've been watching RL.

Was at all 3 games in that series with my standout match in Melbourne, being the first Ashes Test played in Victoria which attracted a crowd of over 30,000 and it appeared half supported GB. Noise was immense and GB scored a resounding win by 33-10 the highest score GB had made in Aus since the 50's.

Andy Platt won MOM but was ably assisted by Schofield at six. Daryl Powell was at centre and Phil Clarke at lock.

Thought we were on a roll to beat the Aussies at Lang Park and take the series but we couldn't manage it......again!

At last, someone speaking sense.

to go slightly off track, i was working at our satellite office at the time in horsham, and despite the distance from the heartlands we had the Lang Park game on the radio (was a morning kick off over here) and everyone was rooting for GB to win that last test. i was the only northerner.

how times change

Woods is spouting rubbish.
The results would have been the same regardless of the shirt.
What we are called is irrelevant. The blame should fall with the coach and the RFL in general.

Whilst I agree with much of your post in principle, I have to ask how competitive Tonga, Samoa or Fiji would be if the same rules were applied to them?
Tonga had 28 of their 29 2019 Squad born outside of Tonga. If you limited them to just 3 heritage players then Australia would put 50 on them in the 1st half, so the question is, do we want to be seen as relevant on the international stage at any cost, or do we accept that we are a minor sport and do the growth thing organically?

Hows this..... have a international league every 4 years.

GB
Australia
New Zealand
Samoa
Fiji
PNG
France
Tonga
2 smaller sides


1 league table.....play it over 2 seasons... everyone plays each other H and A... kind of treat it like a long champions league.... top 2 play off in a straight up final at the end.... have 2 years off and start it again.

Everyone gets lots of gametime at international level and we get rid of these silly teams.. The smaller nations can still play in the minor nations stuff and possibly qualify.

and i get loads of competitive international RL to go and watch.

Fair point, although I was referring specifically to the four home nations and the GB+I team, rather than the overall tier 1 and tier 2 levels of international RL. I wouldn't be putting Scotland in to be 50-0 down at half time against Australia because under my terms only GB+I from the British Isles would be playing against Australia. The Pacific Islanders are a different scenario.

But are they?
Ireland can claim to have maybe 3,000,000 passport holders in the UK at any time. Many more are entitled to claim said passport on the grandparent rule. My Son, a 5 yr old Kiwi can claim an Irish passport, not just because I hold one, but because his Grandfather was born in Ireland. He can also claim and English one, because his grandfather as born in Ireland when it was still part of the UK.
In 2011, 2,000,000 okers referred to themselves as having Irish heritage.
Between the UK and Australia, Ireland, if they were to go down the Jack Charlton route, could be as powerful as any of the Pacific Islands.

The question is, does having a team of heritage players = development of the game, or is it just drilling down into the development already done in NSW/Qland/Auckland and the M62?

GB as a brand was dead and should remain so. It was an ill though out tour that was never going to work and the fact that AU are touring next year to play England underlines this. As does the proposed AU v Toronto farce......if AU want to develop the game, then playing a bunch of mercenaries isn't the way....bringing a 2nd string side to Europe and playing Ireland, Wales, Scotland, England Knights and France midweek does!

If the RFL are serious about the branding of the game and national pride, why not invest a fraction of the money they lost from this tour in paying production costs for the games I suggested to be televised on a FTA chanel? Wednesday night, C5, 7pm KO. Wales v Australia development side......surely it wouldn't rate any worse than an episode of countdown!

Yes, because I was referring specifically to our own Test team, and how I personally believe they would be best represented. Essentially that I favour GB+I rather than England, and how I believe the four separate home nations should operate below Test level. I wasn't talking about the whole of international rugby league and eligibility rules!

The only other sport that feels the need to tour as GB is Union. They do so as an "extra" channel to their being. Are you saying that League should treat Scotland, Ireland, Wales and England as 4 feeder countries to 1 Test side, but Tonga, Samoa and Fiji should be allowed test status?
I have to say that's a very odd stance.
GB, NZ, Australia, PNG & France are the only nations that do not rely on heritage teams. We either accept this, or we embrace heritage teams and "pretend' to have an International Game. Which is it, because there is no middle ground!