Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

An issue arises in that for legal purposes, a local authority is its elected members. They are legally accountable and accountable to the public. An issue arises, in that projects will be funded and the first local councillors may know about it is when they see a JCB on a site or when a member of the public doorsteps or buttonholes them to ask why they are spending money on that particular project. Councillors have to go to officials to find out what the project is, where the money came from, how much it is going to cost, its purpose etc. That kind of situation arises. Because of the way money is coming, there are accountability issues. We have spoken about Mayo a couple of times. I am not totally au fait with the situation and Deputy Dillon would be more familiar with it than am I. However, local councillors are being caught in an awful predicament. The public will see that as money being misappropriated by councillors because they are the public faces of the council. They are legally accountable, as per the Constitution and in statute. The problem is that in many cases, councillors may not even have knowledge of projects that were selected, how they were prioritised or anything else. Perhaps our guests could tell us the main headings under which funding goes to local authorities. I do not want enormous detail.