Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am sharing time with Deputies Michael Healy-Rae and Michael Collins. In his remarks on this issue in January, the Minister of State said the following: "A Programme for a Partnership Government includes a commitment to consider directly elected mayors in cities as part of a broader range of local government reforms." My colleagues and I in the Rural Independent Group looked for that during the talks. He went on to say the following: "The reforms' principal aim is strengthening local democracy and shifting the balance of power, which is lopsided in many respects, between the executive and those who are directly elected by the people." This could not be made up. This Government, which has taken a legislative axe to local democracy, now wants us to believe that it actually cares about local democracy. The Government does not care a whit about it. The Minister of State and the former Minister, big Phil the destroyer, ruined local democracy. Where is the commitment to hold a plebiscite in the borough districts and to put them back? It is a sick joke.

The Minister of State also went on to say: "The executive mayor would have a similar relationship with the local authority chief executive as a Minister has with a Secretary General of a Department." I do not know what kind of Secretaries General there are in the Departments but I certainly do not want that kind of relationship because the Ministers are only standing idly by and nodding. They have their hands on the handlebars of power and the Ministers might as well stay at home. Again, who does the Minister of State think he is kidding? He should be honest and level with us if he thinks this is a democratic advance.

The Government does not care about local democracy and it proved that recently with putting the Cahir electoral area into the Tipperary Cashel area and it left out the brand name of Tipperary. My goodness, how uncaring those officials were, whoever they are. The Minister of State told me one day that they did not mean it. If they do not know where Tipperary is, they do not know where Mullinahone is and so they should not say they have travelled at all.

The Minister of State did not travel very far either if he thinks this will fly. This is going nowhere. It is a dead duck, it is a sop and it is an insult to local democracy and to the people who are in it. Many of them do not want a big salary, they want to serve the people. They were public representatives in the real spirit of the words. They wanted to serve the people, not like the Government wants them to be, earning big salaries and just nodding with the county manager and doing what they are told.

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