Mr. Graham Doyle:

Local government has generally performed well, especially in recent times with some of the circumstances I have mentioned. People at local government level show great commitment and we see that from councillors. There have been a number of efforts to improve the situation the Deputy referred to and to support councillors over time. There have been developments such as the Moorhead report, there has been training, and efforts have been made to try to recognise some of the issues for people operating at local government level. In some cases people do it full time and in some cases they operate differently. It is clearly a challenging and onerous position for somebody to have and no doubt it requires a significant time commitment. Some of the efforts and reforms in recent years have been undertaken with that in mind.