Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank my colleague, Deputy Cassells, for bringing forward this Bill this evening. From listening to the commentary so far I believe it has been a very welcome and positive move. The Bill aims to bring decision making back to local communities. The fundamental purpose of the Bill is to empower local communities by enabling the towns across Ireland to have an opportunity to fight for their own areas. Abolishing town councils has left many urban areas without a voice. It resulted in paltry savings and robbed people of local representations. It deprived towns of councils dedicated solely to fighting their corner. In my own county of Galway we lost Ballinasloe, Loughrea and Tuam. The work that was put in through the years is very evident. In Loughrea, when it got its new motorway, everyone said that it was going to bypass them and they would be left out. In fact, the town council there had a direct inroad with the county council and worked really well with them. It managed to get two exits, and even though it is 10 km from where the motorway is Loughrea is a good, vibrant town because of it. Ballinasloe and Tuam lost their town councils and have lost a voice. Those towns are not getting the representation they need. They do not have the nine local representatives from their own town representing them on issues such as rates and car parking. When Ballinasloe was disbanded some €20 million was given over to Galway County Council that never came back, and then a process of equalisation had to be carried out with their funding. These towns are struggling and need the support of a local voice. The moneys they had amounted to very little. They were used for the tidy towns or the local voluntary groups. In fact, the major loss was the opportunity to get to the round table and talk with executives. There are now 39 councillors on the county council. Some €500,000 was spent extending the chamber to facilitate all of the new members.

While I believe that the municipal areas are working really well - I was part of it - there should be another layer where the voices of the larger towns can be heard.

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