Joanna Tuffy (Dublin Mid West, Labour)

Councillors should be held accountable for their bad decisions but this should not be at the expense of local democracy. The people who elect councillors have a fundamental say in local democracy and it would be a terrible irony if the outcome of the economic downturn and the collapse of Anglo Irish Bank is the loss of the people's right to give a mandate to their local representatives.

I will be pressing the amendment as I fear the Minister will do a Colm McCarthy and abolish councils because local democracies does not matter when it is all about money at the end of the day.

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