Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I support this legislation and I am glad that the plebiscite was successful in Limerick because it provides the opportunity to progress with this. The idea of directly elected mayors is important.

The points I will raise have been raised by a lot of others but I will make two points: one on detail; and the other on power. On detail, the margin in the plebiscite in Cork was narrow. We supported the campaign in favour of it and we were active in that but it was narrow. I believe that the Government wanted it to go through, but if it had not wanted it to go through, then this would have been exactly the way to succeed in not letting it through. The only thing people in Cork knew about this proposal was how much the mayor of Cork was going to get and how much in expenses he or she was going to get. Right from the start that was all they knew about. If that is the entire discussion and if people are not able to talk about what the mayor can do in transport, housing or meaningful things for people's lives then you are on a loser straight away. That was a big part of the problem and it seems to me it is still a bit of a problem. There is a lot more clarity in respect of allowances and the budget attached to the mayor, which obviously is necessary, than on the executive powers of the mayor. That will be important.

The other point I will make is that we have a severe deficit when it comes local government in this State. That applies within councils, as well as between local government and local authorities. I remember my first year as a councillor, and the Minister of State was a councillor himself. In your first year, you get in there and you get your legs under the desk and you think you will make a difference when you are bright and green. I asked the chief executive when the capital budget would come forward and I was told that it would be in January, which was grand. The capital budget came forward and a sheet was provided to councillors. I asked if we would be able to vote on it and we were told we would not be able to do so and that it was just for noting. That is no complaint against Tim Lucey, who is finishing up in the coming weeks and who did a fine job. He was just explaining the way things work to me. I was amazed to learn that councillors have no role in respect of the capital budget. Councillors do not have a function regarding the kind of things that people out in the street imagine they are deciding, such as swimming pools, libraries and houses; the big stuff that matters to people in terms of public services.

That will be really important. If people are going to come back after a couple of years of a directly elected mayor, whatever about who the incumbent is, if they have any sense that the role is delivering, they will need to have a sense that this person can effect change in all those areas. That is crucially important. Some of that will involve examining the nature of funding streams that exist for capital projects and so on. Even aside from that capital point, an awful lot more can be done regarding executive and reserve functions that can assist any directly elected mayor. I do not want to call it an experiment but it is an important trial. It is potentially a model that can be applied elsewhere but for that to happen, the mayors need to have powers to make a difference and I hope that is the case.

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