Joanna Tuffy (Dublin Mid West, Labour)

No, we wanted the Eircom stadium which the Football Association of Ireland wanted. Everything was done at Government level to try to stop us making a democratic decision about the stadium because it wanted to promote Deputy Ahern's great big project, a huge potential white elephant. The Government had the wrong point of view and the local councillors had the right idea and wanted to do something in the interests of the local community.

Local councillors often have a good relationship with the local county manager and can sometimes do more than the average back bencher and the Government in terms of making decisions which are good for the local community. I accept that bad decisions are sometimes taken but that is democracy and people are accountable through the electoral system and the many different reforms and legislation that makes them accountable, such as the Ethics in Public Office Act and so on.

Deputy Gogarty betrayed something because the gist of what he said was that the lower levels, meaning councillors, cannot be trusted. He also said something which indicated that he did not think the manager could be trusted, therefore the power should be given to the Minister. I have set out an example which shows that Ministers do not always do the right thing. What about the separation of national and local democracy? By allowing Ministers to make local development plans, the Bill erodes local democracy. The terrible thing is that Fianna Fáil Members are letting this happen because they are cowed by their party's own planning record.

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