Pat Buckley (Cork East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Since the town councils were abolished, morale has been very low. I have spoken to many ex-councillors and I keep in touch with my own municipal district office and so on. Since the abolition of town councils the democratic right of the people has been taken away at a very core level, which is local politics. I do not often use the word "oligarchy", but it has replaced democracy. We are being governed by the few. As many Deputies have pointed out here tonight, the municipal district does not have bidding power and, as Deputy Munster said, they are feeling pretty toothless. If that is putting people first then we have much to learn about it.

Deputy Ó Caoláin referred to issues locally and these include cuts to Leader programme funding. The then Minister, Phil Hogan, spoke about the great property tax that would be spent on local services. We have not seen it going into local services. Rural towns and villages in Ireland are absolutely falling apart. We have area engineers and municipal district officers who must wait two years to draw down funding for low-cost safety measures while people are being knocked down in housing estates. Is this local government? Is this local democracy? Is this representing the people? It is absolutely ludicrous. Two children were knocked down in Fermoy within a number of months in a housing estate and we still cannot get road safety measures. Where is the local representation? We have been banging our heads against the wall on this matter. Workers in Cork County Council have gone out on strike over staffing agreements. The best way to replace local council workers was the Gateway programme, but it does not work. Some years ago we had flooding in Midleton and out of a possible 22 staff, six were on the books. That is who looked after the town. That is not local representation.

I welcome the Bill and hope it will be extremely progressive. Obviously, it can be broadened out and it is vital that we get information back from our own local councillors and from our municipal district officers. They are feeling the pain. The area engineers would have a better chance of emptying the Red Sea with a bucket with no ass in it than what they have to do with the pennies and pittance they get at local government. I could speak on the Bill for hours but it must be remembered that democracy starts at home. The local lad has the local knowledge. The local councils were perfect; I sat on them, they had the power and they represented the people locally. It was a bottom up approach, not the top down. This is what is ruining the country.

See this speech in context