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

Local government areas are specified in primary legislation. Section 12 of the Local Government Reform Act 2014 states the State is divided into local government areas known counties and cities and cities and counties. The Local Government Act 2001, as amended, provides for three cities - Cork, Dublin and Galway - and for each of them to have a city council. If an additional city council were to be established in law, it would have significant implications for the county in which the area concerned was situated, particularly with regard to the loss of functions of the relevant county council. This would, in fact, be the reverse of actions taken under the Local Government Reform Act 2014 which saw the integration of two existing city councils, Limerick and Waterford, with populations of 87,000 and 47,000, respectively, into two new stronger and better resourced city and county councils. In both cases, the description "city" continues to apply to their status as major urban centres. That status is in no way diminished by the fact that they no longer have separate local authorities. On the contrary, all of the indications are that both have progressed significantly in the past few years, not least in terms of economic activity. If Drogheda were to be considered for such a fundamental change in local government arrangements, as suggested in the Topical Issue, it would have wide-ranging implications not only for Louth County Council but also for Meath County Council. While a rigorous examination would be needed if a proposal to upgrade to city status was contemplated by the Government, it is possible to identify likely implications at a broad level, including, legal, financial, organisational and possibly electoral consequences, all of which would require careful and detailed analysis.

The town of Drogheda has recently been the subject of a local authority boundary review, as the Deputy mentioned. In June 2015 an independent statutory committee was appointed to carry out a review of local government boundaries in Athlone, Carlow, Drogheda and Waterford. In each case the committee was asked to carry out a review of the boundary between the respective local authorities and make recommendations with respect to those boundaries and any consequential matter it considered necessary in the interests of effective local government. The main rationale for undertaking the boundary reviews is that in each case there is a significant overspill of population into another county based on the population figures taken from the 2011 census. In the case of Drogheda, the town has expanded significantly into County Meath, with a population of nearly 6,000 reported as being located in County Meath in the 2011 census, which represents nearly 16% of the total population of the town and environs of 38,578. The report of the Drogheda boundary committee was submitted on 16 February 2017 and did not recommend, as the Deputy said, an extension of the boundary.

I have been to Drogheda a number of times and I am more than aware of the pressures on the town and the pace at which the population is growing and the need for both local and national government to respond to that pace of growth through the provision of social, community and quality of life infrastructure. Part of it has to involve good local governance. We have looked and are continuing to look at restructuring local government in Cork, Galway, Waterford and south Kilkenny. During these processes we will learn lessons and find better ways to govern in areas that have more than one boundary.

We also need to learn lessons in the context of the continued growth of Drogheda.

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