Mr. Ruairí McGinley:

The officials would like that. Our CEO would be very active in presenting reports to the first meeting. The political imperative in this council term, which runs until summer 2018, has been, for the reasons that we have outlined, to keep to less than 15%. That view is shared across all of the political groupings, including Sinn Féin. From left to right, a significant majority have said so. We have issues in squaring up the budget and we try to be responsible. Clearly, we are foregoing certain ideas that the CEO would like to achieve.

In terms of the budget, a certain level of buoyancy has come back into the economy and, as a result, our income has increased year-on-year, which is healthy. Equally, the ravages of the recession are real and I mean in terms of the condition of footpaths, which is a subject that I have touched on. The condition of footpaths is probably the most mentioned issue to me. When I go anywhere, and I am sure it is the same for other councillors, people will tell me to please take a look at the footpath outside of people's houses.

In terms of projects, it varies from local authority to local authority. We do what we think is feasible. There are other political views. As I have mentioned here, the Labour Party, and the Green Party, in particular, consistently challenge us each year. The CEO also consistently challenges us. There are quite detailed reports on this so it is not just a "by the way" decision. We square things and Dublin City Council might be unusual by making sure that everybody participates.