Alan Dillon (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Troy, a person who has, as he has said, vast experience in public life, for proposing this important draft legislation. I also thank the other Members who will contribute to this debate for their interest in the question of local authority public administration. As Minister of State with responsibility for local government and planning, I am particularly interested in this Bill and the questions it raises.

Over ten years ago, we started what is perhaps the most significant process of reform of local government in the State's history. Since then, many of the policies set down in the 2012 publication, Putting People First: Action Programme for Effective Local Government, have been given legislative effect through the Local Government Reform Act 2014. This allowed us to effect a number of reforms that aimed to place the citizen at the heart of what local government does and to enhance the role of local authorities in a number of areas, including economic development, economic support and climate action. In a number of respects, the Bill can therefore be seen to be consistent with these reforms towards effective public service and this is to be welcomed. For this reason, the Government has decided not to oppose the Bill, even though it requires further careful consideration.

On the Bill's provisions concerning queries from public representatives, I note that this is a statutory requirement of regulations made under section 237A of the Local Government Act 2001, as amended in 2003, which require that local authorities have arrangements in place to provide information to local Oireachtas Members at regular briefings. These regulations were put in place when the dual mandate was abolished to ensure that Members of these Houses would have the same access to information from local authorities as local authority elected members. This was considered particularly important to assist Members of Dáil Éireann and Seanad Éireann in their local representative role. My understanding and that of my Department is that local authorities comply with the requirements of these regulations, with some providing an even higher level of service than that prescribed.

Given the wide range of services that local authorities provide and the very large number of customers who interact with the services, it is occasionally the case that people who make a query to a local authority or who follow a complaints procedure are not satisfied with the answer or outcome they receive. In such cases, members of the public or public representatives who are dissatisfied with the administration of services, once they have exhausted the complaints process of the relevant local authority, already have recourse to the Office of the Ombudsman. In addition to requesting that customers have exhausted the complaints process of the relevant public body, the Ombudsman also requests that the customer has allowed the service provider up to 42 days to respond and that he or she has received a final response to the complaint before escalating it to the Ombudsman. The Bill goes a step further and provides that, where a local authority fails to comply with the requirement to reply within a specific timeline, a correspondent may bypass the local authority's complaint process and lodge a complaint against the local authority with the Ombudsman. Care must be taken that, in providing such direct recourse to the Ombudsman, the Bill will not risk an increase in relatively minor complaints, which would be impractical for the Ombudsman to handle and which would remove the Ombudsman's focus from more serious complaints. Therefore, the local complaints procedure should be followed in the first instance.

Regarding the Bill's proposal to bring local authority chief executives before the Committee of Public Accounts, it is important to recall the role of local government in recognition of Article 28A of Bunreacht na hÉireann. The statutory independence of local authorities in the performance of their duties is further set down in section 63 of the Local Government Act 2001. At this point, it is not clear how this Bill's objectives are in line with the constitutional and legislative independence of local government or how the independent role of local elected councillors, to whom chief executives are currently answerable, is to be considered. Indeed, the primary oversight and governance of local authorities rests with the elected council. These important points need to be addressed as the Bill progresses.

I remind colleagues that the Committee of Public Accounts does not examine the spending of individual local authorities, which are audited by the Local Government Audit Service rather than the Comptroller and Auditor General. The National Oversight and Audit Commission is the national independent oversight body for the local government sector in Ireland. I attended NOAC's tenth anniversary last week and I recommend that colleagues review the vast amount of information on its website, including all of its detailed scrutiny reports on local authorities.

I further add that Ireland is a party to the Council of Europe's European Charter of Local Self-Government, which requires us to ensure robust independent local government in the State. Parties to the charter are subject to periodic monitoring visits to assess compliance towards meeting its requirements. Ireland's review was completed last May. While there are many positives in the final monitoring visit report of October last year, the monitoring team criticised our centralised system of government stating that "on the whole, administrative supervision of local government is extensive and detailed, and there are no signs that central supervision is about to be relaxed". Such concerns will need to be addressed in the next Stages of debate on the Bill to ensure that the independence of local government and the vital role of local authority elected members, who, like those of us in these Houses, are accountable to the electorate, are recognised.

I thank Deputy Troy for initiating this Bill and this debate. As advised, the Government is not opposing the Bill. I look forward to further debate.

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