Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Technical Group for giving me a few minutes to speak on this motion and I thank Fianna Fáil for putting it forward.

There have been long discussions about so-called alignment between local development companies and local government. However, there has always been a grave concern about this area. Why were these local entrepreneurial companies established in the first place? They were established because local government just did not deliver. That was certainly my experience in the north side of Dublin when ordinary volunteers created bodies like the Northside Community Law Centre, the Northside Centre for the Unemployed and, in my own case, when Pat Daly and I founded the Coolock Development Council. We saw there was a significant necessity for an entrepreneurial culture to be fostered in our community to help people lift themselves up by their bootstraps and create jobs for themselves, particularly when this function was not carried out by national or local government. Accordingly, I strongly share the reservations listed in the motion.

In July 2013, Smith Everett & Associates produced a useful analysis for the Irish Local Development Network which showed, for example, that between 2010 and 2012, LDCs provided a net gain for the Exchequer of more than €311 million, €7.8 million per company. LDCs have provided a range of services besides the enterprise function and job creation such as local transport initiatives, local security companies, child care and youth facilities. Up to 23,828 people were employed by LDCs in 2012, making it an important part of local development.

I share the concerns expressed in this debate about for-profit, private sector companies in direct competition with LDCs which have emerged from local initiatives. The trade union movement, particularly the Irish Congress of Trade Unions and Peter Cassells, played a fundamental role in the late 1980s and early 1990s in responding to people like me who were on the ground involved in local development companies and who came forward with the process of creating Leader and other partnership programmes. We need to tread carefully in this area.

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