Shane Cassells (Fianna Fail)
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I thank everyone who came and participated today. There are not too many opportunities where political operatives from across the sphere, from elected representatives to general secretaries to people from academia, come together in a room for a number of hours and have a discussion. Maybe if we did it more and had that enlightened discourse, it would help the process. As Mr. Sheehan mentioned, there is unfortunately a lack of civility in our debates. Can I start on the word Mr. Moylan used and that was "trust", in particular central government's potential lack of trust in local government. I would not necessarily disagree with Mr. Moylan, but why? Touching on Councillor Shannon's point in terms of decisions that were not taken in the past, in particular in large areas of waste plans, county plans and so forth; I worked on several county plans and there were some guys who would have zoned a lake if they could have. We then had a scenario where the Office of the Planning Regulator was established and then there is another layer.

The trust worked both ways. That trust is coming back and there is a sense of trust from central government, where we see a divesting of financial resources in the form of billions of euro through the URDF funding for councils to administer to regenerate their areas.

Many contributors have spoken to that, from Councillor Ryan's point about the municipal districts to Mr. Dorgan's point about that layer of town councils. I am a strong advocate for town councils but not in the guise in which they were. I set that out when I was local government spokesperson in the previous term. Mr. Sparks from the Labour Party mentioned Deputy Howlin's Bill. I tabled a Bill myself a year prior to that, in 2017, and that remains on the books in committee in that respect. We set out the manner in which it could be done because, as the point was made, we have moved. Mr. Kelly made a point about 80 town councils representing 14%. The population boundaries they represented were far greater than the administrative boundaries because they had not changed over the 100 years. It was not a fair reflection. Through national planning policy, we have urbanised this country, especially in the past 20 years. Towns are not about just the people who live in them. They are a shared urban space for those who come in to do business and for civic events, and they are greater than just the streets they make up.

On the points made about online abuse, this is something on which, through my work on the online media Bill and in the media committee, we have had several engagements with the social media companies. The manner in which they do their business now, in using AI technology rather than human beings in analysing online hate, is not catching much of what is happening. There has to be further engagement from all arms of the Government in respect of this because if there is not, we will be entering a very dangerous space. We cannot ignore the reality that the companies exists, but the manner in which we do our business with them has to change.

Equally, and this applies to local government members but, in particular, to national politicians, not a whole lot of people in here can hold their head up high when it comes to discourse on social media. That is a lesson for politicians as well, because some of what comes out of here, from these Houses, online is just as damaging as that which is directed our way. A bit of leadership in here would not go amiss.

In respect of the points Mr. O’Brien from Sinn Féin made regarding public engagement and those statistics on the decreasing level of voters, it is worrying and it is happening in other countries. We saw the turnout in the UK elections last week. Equally, and this is something I study, there is a point about the membership of political parties. In the UK in the 1950s, there was a thriving sense of membership of political parties, where the Conservative Party had 2.8 million members and the Labour Party 1 million. Today, the Conservatives have 172,000 members. It is a stark decline in our public process and it is something all the general secretaries, I am sure, will take on board as we try to re-engage with the public.

I again thank the witnesses. Of all the sessions, today has been the most enlightening. I thank them for their time, for their effort and for the contributions they have made. For the Cathaoirleach, the rapporteurs or the members, it has been very worthwhile.