Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I take the Deputy’s point. When considering new reforms around local government in the programme for Government, we are ensuring local government funding structures and responsibilities will strengthen local democracy. There will be the devolution of new powers to local authorities, the reduction in the size of local electoral areas, the possible introduction of directly elected mayors in cities, the possibility of extending the remit of the Comptroller and Auditor General and the Committee of Public Accounts to include expenditure by local authorities and a review of supports for councillors in consultation with the Association of Irish Local Government and the Local Authority Members Association. We have committed to reviewing how local government functions and is funded, and the devolution of powers from the centre to local authorities and we will do that by the middle of next year. Within that context, we will seriously look at whether we should revisit town councils and how they would be structured. We are not going to replicate what was there previously, whereby some towns had councils but others did not for historical reasons. We want consistency where, if a town’s population chooses, then they would have the option but that there is fair treatment of towns across the country to give everybody the same opportunity.

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