Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank all of the team and the participants in the assembly. I want to acknowledge the enormous amount of work people did because it is an intense process. It is very helpful to us.

I am a very strong supporter of a directly-elected mayor and, in fact, Cabinet-style accountable government at local authority level. Like the assembly members, I think a plebiscite is a useful way to generate public awareness of that prior to the votes. I welcome those parts of the report.

However, for some of us there is a terrible sense of déjà vu. I was on the mayoral forum that people will remember, under Phil Hogan, where the four local Dublin local authorities were asked to consider whether we should have a plebiscite. In south Dublin we voted in favour of the holding of a plebiscite in 2014. However, because of a lack of clarity on what we were voting on for, people in Fingal took a different decision and the plebiscite never happened.

Likewise, when the plebiscites in Cork, Waterford and Limerick took place, one of the great challenges for people in favour of a yes vote in those counties was that nobody knew what they were voting on. In fact, while Limerick got it over the line it was a hair's breadth of a margin. Cork and Waterford did not get it over the line. We are almost four years on from the votes and we still do not have full visibility on what the fully directly elected mayor will do because the legislation has not been passed and enacted. The vote for that mayor is only six months away.

If there is to be a plebiscite next year, and if the plebiscite is for a directly elected mayor, how important is it for the Government to clarify in clear terms, in advance of any plebiscite, what it is people are voting on, separate from what the powers are?

This would be separate to the question of powers, as none of us will decide those. Rather, they will be decided by the Government. I am looking for the witnesses to advise us. We can recommend whether to hold a plebiscite and its wording, but we can also make recommendations to the Government to ensure that those of us who want to see this get across the line achieve that. If the witnesses have other observations from their considerations on what went right and wrong in Limerick, Waterford and Cork, I would be interested in hearing them. We will get one shot at this in Dublin. If we have the plebiscite and it falls, it will be a decade or more before we return to this. I am interested in whatever advice the witnesses would give us to give the Government about the best way to proceed in advance of the vote.