Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

City status is an important issue for everybody in County Louth, particularly in Drogheda, and, indeed, in east Meath. The area has grown phenomenally in Drogheda, east Meath and south Louth. The Central Statistics Office, CSO, has released figures that show the town of Drogheda has a population in excess of 40,000. On the north side of Drogheda there is planning permission for over 5,000 homes and on the south side of Drogheda, there is huge development both in County Meath and in Drogheda itself. I think a critical mass will be reached by the next census. The CSO has told me that the population of the town will exceed 50,000 within the next five years or so.

I believe that the petition should be left open. Also, the correspondence received from the Department does not address the issue of city status at all, which is one good reason to keep the petition open. There is an even better reason for doing so. The people of the Drogheda area have no control over their destiny, they have no local council and all of the administration is based in Dundalk. This is a town that is bigger than the administrative counties of Longford or Leitrim. It is unacceptable that Drogheda would not be designated a city and have its own city manager.

Galway was deemed a city when its population reached 38,000. What happened then was that the county manager of Galway became the city manager for Galway city and the county manager for Galway county. That person held both positions until retirement, after which the jobs were advertised separately. As part of the process, the present county manager should be made a county manger of the city of Drogheda and when she ceases to hold that office, a county manager for the city of Drogheda should be appointed. In that way the budgets would be merged and there would be a complete regulation of how budgets are managed, who gets what and who contributes to what.

In east Meath there are huge planning issues and a huge controversy about developments, which are the subject of serious complaints and high-level investigations into planning irregularities. There was one plan for the whole area that was produced by Meath County Council and Louth County Council but it was overturned by a former municipal council area in east Meath, which led to a huge and disgraceful controversy. To avoid all of that I ask that we seek further clarification, contact the Central Statistics Office and examine the process. This is the first time that I have attended this committee and I am not an official member of the committee. However, I call on the committee to examine the process by which an area gets city status, and I mean discover the nuts and bolts of what one must do in terms of administrative joining up together.

One cannot hold back the town of Drogheda and it is going to be a city. It is the biggest town in Ireland outside of the main cities. I ask the committee to keep this issue alive, hold further debates and seek more facts. We must control our destiny. A local bid committee is trying to raise funding to improve the town and have additionality from the business community. The committee is very anxious that that would happen. Drogheda wants to improve and grow, the recognition of which would be to make Drogheda a city. Making it a city is only a word. Drogheda must have a city manager and the accompanying administrative powers and infrastructure.