Sean Barrett (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I sometimes wonder whether the Government is too much in favour of centralisation. This Administration and its opinion pollsters, opinion formers, etc., received a very rude answer to the question relating to the proposed abolition of this House. It just might find that local authorities are much more popular than imagined. The decision to abolish the requirement with regard to electing the members of the board of Údarás na Gaeltachta was an incredibly bad one. None of the analysis relating to why our economy crashed attributes responsibility to the fact that we had too much democracy. The crash might, however, have been due to the fact that there was too great a concentration of power. For example, less than a handful of people made all the vital decisions in September 2008. It would be a pity if the Government were always to be against both local democracy and participation. I do not believe it was elected on such a mandate. As Senators on this side have noted, it is regrettable that the Government appears to have undue faith in quangos and always wants to abolish democratically elected bodies. This is the fourth successive occasion on which it has engaged in such an abolition. I am of the view that this is a mistake in the context of the quality of democracy in this country.