Pat Gallagher (Donegal South West, Fianna Fail)

There have been no major changes in the aspects of the Bill the local authorities are dealing with, but we had a seminar with local authority officials last year. We keep the county managers and, consequently, the members of the local authorities fully briefed and we will continue to do that. We will work closely with them and I give a personal assurance to the House that the relevant officials in the Department and I will monitor developments closely. A bottom-up approach is being taken. Many members of local authorities throughout the country were anxious that the Bill be enacted to allow them to proceed as quickly as possible with the preparation of the by-laws, bearing in mind that it will take a month plus seven days after the public consultation process before they can become effective.

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