Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I agree that we need to have a wider debate on what the reform of our system of governance, in the widest sense, should mean and should look like. Having said that, I am intimately aware of the reason we need to pass this legislation. Along with Deputy Finian McGrath, I took a constitutional case in 2007 regarding the timeline within which we are required to work. I believe the 2007 general election was deeply unfair because ten constituencies were radically out of line with the average.

We took the case because it was an affront to democracy and the substance of the point subsequently found its way into law. As Mr. Justice Frank Clarke said at the time, the obligation was not on the Minister or on the Government but on the Oireachtas, once a commission is set up, to within six months bring in legislation that will have the boundaries altered. This is because the 2007 elections were basically fought on the 2002 census as opposed to the 2006 census. It is just one thing that needs to be done but we have an obligation to do it.

The public expectation was that reform would look very different from what has in fact transpired. There was an expectation there would be a radically reduced number of TDs. That, of course, would have required a constitutional amendment because, while there is a tolerance on either end, there must be one TD for between 20,000 and 30,000 people, with rough parity - it is not exact but it has to be near enough. Essentially, the kind of reductions that were being talked about were never going to transpire in the absence of a constitutional amendment being passed by the citizens of this country.

It was very dangerous to do that. It was to suggest we had too much democracy and that this was the cause of our problem. In fact, I would argue the reverse, but I would also argue that democracy and the outlets for citizen engagement are not wide enough and not open enough to something beyond a representative democracy. I believe the change has not just to happen in regard to the number of TDs but also in regard to the relationship between the Legislature and the Executive. It has to take the localism out of the national Parliament and place it where there is a particular genius in this country.

One often hears people say things like "We are better than this". We are better than this. When one considers some of the organic developments at local level - for example, the credit union movement, the GAA, the co-operative movement, the Tidy Towns, the level of volunteerism and the trust that exists at local level, where people know each other - how is it that we do not build this into our governance? I believe it would unleash something that would truly be a democratic revolution. The notion that democratic revolution is a Government made up of two thirds of the Parliament is really quite insulting, and I wish people would stop using that phrase as it is simply not true. The issues of the use of the guillotine and the shoehorning of key legislation into very tight timelines so there is not ample time to debate it need to feature in the kind of debate we have.

To go back to the origins of the local government system, it pretty much developed as a result of the shiring of counties, which was about putting in a sheriff to maintain control for the Crown. It was all about control. We are pretty bad in that regard. If anyone tries to control Irish people, they will resent it. This is about designing a system that gives people a lot more flexibility and trusts the citizens of this country - it is about deepening democracy. If one looks to countries where this has been done, there is a particularly good example in Colombia, where the capital city was redeveloped in conjunction with a deep democratic involvement of the people, and the results are there to be seen in terms of reduced crime rates and greater levels of equality. There are other examples around the world that we should be looking at. There is often one opportunity in a lifetime to really radically reform. Unfortunately, what we are doing is tinkering at the edges rather than doing something with people that will leave something lasting in regard to deepening our democracy.

I was a county councillor and a town councillor for many years and I know we could operate in a radically different way in both areas. The town council I was involved with became a facilitator of the local community and networked that local community. Not a single, solitary penny will be saved to this State as a consequence of abolishing that town council. I would have liked a much bigger debate about what it is that people identify with, and what it is that would unleash the kind of common purpose that could be garnered by a deeper and different kind of democracy that is much more inclusive than what is being proposed. I believe this is tinkering at the edges, it is piecemeal and it is a wasted opportunity. As I said, this is a time for the deepening of democracy.

With regard to local government reform, we currently have a managerial system and a system of local administration, and I do not foresee that changing substantially. There is a mistrust between the centre and the local. While some of that was understandable in the early days of the State, we do not seem to have moved on from that. Unless we do move on, I do not believe we will see that localism being taken out of the national Parliament and placed exactly where it should be. The idea of the parish pump is actually very positive if it is in the right place. It is about collaboration, about a community coming together and about people looking after each other. If this Parliament was de-cluttered from the excessive localism we see here, we would have a Parliament that would function more in the way parliaments function in other countries. There is an ample number of examples in other countries and we should be looking at best case scenarios rather than just tinkering at the edges.

I completely accept there is a need for this legislation. I would like to see an electoral commission permanently in place to deal with issues such as the register of electors, which is very hit and miss, and to deal with matters that arise at the time of referenda. To have such a commission permanently in place would mean we are building towards something and it would provide checks and balances to the Executive. To conclude, I accept the decision of the commission in the work it did and I will be supporting the legislation on that basis.

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