Kieran O'Donnell (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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I move:

That Standing Order 187 is modified in accordance with Standing Order 233(2) to provide that it be an instruction to the Committee in relation to the Local Government (Mayor of Limerick) Bill 2023, that the Committee has power to make amendments to the Bill which are outside the scope of the existing subject matter of the Bill in relation to:

• the Local Government Act 2001 (as amended by the Public Service Management (Recruitment and Appointments Act) 2004) to provide that consultation is required with the Public Appointments Service rather than the Commission for Public Service Appointments prior to declaring qualifications for posts in local authorities that fall within the remit of section 160(1)(b) of the Local Government Act 2001;
• the Local Government Act 2001 to ensure that qualifications declared by the Minister under section 160 of the Act prior to the commencement of the Local Government (Mayor of Limerick) Act 2023 shall not be affected by reason only that consultation with the Commission for Public Service Appointments did not take place;
• the Local Government Act 2001 to provide that any legal proceedings challenging a declaration made under section 160 of the Local Government Act 2001 prior to the commencement of the relevant section of the Local Government (Mayor of Limerick) Act 2023 will not be affected by this amendment;
• the Affordable Housing Act of 2021 to confirm Fresh Start as provided for in Section 10(3) and 10(5) in the Act, as allowing for the previous ownership of more than the one dwelling in the case of divorce/separation, and in the case of bankruptcy or insolvency, essentially wiping a person’s previous ownership record; the definition of the Fresh Start would be broadened to effectively re-set to First Time Buyer status in the case of divorce/separation and bankruptcy/insolvency;

and to make other consequential amendments required to take account of the changes above.

The purpose of this motion is to instruct the Dáil, in committee, that Standing Order 187 is modified in accordance with Standing Order 233(2) to provide that the committee has the power to make amendments to the Local Government (Mayor of Limerick) Bill 2023 which are outside the existing subject matter of the Bill.

As set out in the motion, there are amendments to the Local Government Act 2001 and the Affordable Housing Act 2021. The local government-related amendments do not introduce any policy change and are technical or clarifying in nature. A core role of my Department is to support and enable democratic, responsive and effective local government. To deliver this role, my Department has a number of functions, including ensuring the local government sector is enabled to manage workforce requirements to meet evolving business and public needs more efficiently.

The Local Government Act 2001 , in section 160, provides the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage with the power to declare qualifications for roles in the local government sector. The Act sets out the steps to be taken by the Minister in the process for declaring qualifications, including prior consultation. The amendments proposed to section 160(1)(b) of the Local Government Act 2001 are to correct what may have been a technical error at the time section 160 of the Local Government Act 2001 was amended in section 6(1) of the Public Service Management (Recruitment and Appointments) Act 2004. The amendment changed the original body the Minister is required to consult when declaring qualifications for certain local government roles from the Local Appointments Commissioners to the Commission for Public Service Appointments. However, this should in fact have been changed to the Public Appointments Service and, since 2004, consultation has inadvertently been taking place with the Public Appointments Service. Both the Public Appointments Service and the Commission for Public Service Appointments were established in 2004 and the Local Appointments Commission was dissolved at that point. The Public Appointments Service assumed the role previously undertaken by the Local Appointments Commissioners with regard to the recruitment of senior roles in the local government sector. The role of the Commission for Public Service Appointments is as the principal regulator of recruitment and selection in the Irish public service. It is now intended to amend the Local Government Act to reflect the consultation practice that has been in operation and ensure the validity of earlier declarations which will not be held to be invalid by reason only of the fact that consultation with the Commission for Public Service Appointments did not take place. It is also intended to include a specific provision which provides that the amendment will not affect any legal cases that are in being or extant.

The affordable housing-related amendments seek to clarify and better define the policy intent of fresh start and the practical implementation of the principle. Housing for All delivers on the programme for Government commitment to step up housing supply and put affordability at the heart of the housing system. Housing for All sets out the policy objective of the fresh start principle, which is to enable people who are divorced or separated or who have undergone bankruptcy or insolvency proceedings and no longer have a financial interest in the family home to be eligible to apply for affordable housing schemes. The outcome of the fresh start principle is to effectively bring a person back to the status of a first-time buyer in order for them to be able to apply for an affordable home. The fresh start principle forms a key element in Housing for All and has been applied across the affordable and mortgage schemes run by the Department. With respect to the local authority affordable purchase scheme, the application of the fresh start principle is set out in legislation in section 10 of the Affordable Housing Act 2021. Since the passage of the Affordable Housing Act 2021 and in light of the application of the fresh start principle, the proposed amendments seek to offer additional clarity as to the application of fresh start. It is proposed to amend section 10(3) and section 10(5) of the Affordable Housing Act 2021 so that a relevant fresh start event will reset a person’s status to first-time buyer after divorce or separation, or bankruptcy or insolvency, in the case of the local authority affordable purchase scheme, regardless of the number of previous properties a person may have owned. To be eligible for fresh start an applicant must have lost, as part of the fresh start event, the family home or principal primary residence and the applicant must not own, or have a beneficial entitlement to an estate or interest in, any dwelling in the State or elsewhere. Increasing affordable and private housing supply for those looking to purchase a home is key to improving our housing system and this change forms a further part of the overall response to current and emerging affordability needs.

I ask for the support of the Members of the House for this motion to enable these important amendments to be tabled.

Richard O'Donoghue (Limerick County, Independent)
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On the directly elected mayor, a vote was taken and 51% were in favour and 49% against. I had my concerns at the start of this about the cost of a mayor for Limerick exceeding €500,000 per year. At the start, it was said the local authority would have to fund this, but now the Government is going to fund it for the first term. After that, I believe it is to come back out of the budget of the local authority. That is €500,000-plus coming out of a local authority's budget to have a mayor that was recently only to cost about €60,000. That is a fair increase to have a directly elected mayor. The powers of the mayor have also been well diluted. If we are to have a mayor of Limerick city and county, we would like them to have the necessary powers. At the housing committee the Minister of State said of the directly elected mayor that it was in the programme for Government, but the LNG terminals were also in the programme and the Government has done a bit of a U-turn on that, so things that are in the programme for Government do not always stand up.

As a Limerick person, I go with the majority of people who voted for this. I have to work with this and will be doing so for the people of Limerick who voted for it. I have major concerns about it, the costing of it and with the powers the mayor will have. Something I also raised with the Minister of State at the committee was the staffing of this and the staff a mayor is allowed choose him or herself, which he or she may choose from the council staff. Again, I have a major concern there. I am not saying the council staff would not be good enough, but if I was the mayor of Limerick I would like to have my own people around me. I could have one or two council staff, but I would like to have my own advisers and staff around me to make the difference I would like in my term in office.

Based on the housing strategy for Limerick and around the country, not only this Government but previous Governments going back decades have failed the people when it comes to infrastructure, especially in Limerick. I keep saying it in this Chamber. The Minister, Deputy O'Brien, was in Limerick announcing houses being opened and we went around to five or six areas where houses were being announced. Every place we went around, I asked the Minister to ask the developer or contractors there how much capacity was left in the system and everyone said we are at maximum capacity and can build no more houses, until you come back towards the city. The Minister quickly realised over two thirds of County Limerick has no infrastructure. Work on a water supply has been started in Croom. It should have been the new pipeline coming from Limerick out to the village to supply the area, but the work only started yesterday. It was due to start more than 12 months ago, but due to contractors and the price increases, it did not.

I am glad to say the contractors are now on the ground and, I hope, in quarter 3 of next year, they will have a good and uninterrupted water supply for Croom. There was a fire in Croom a few months ago and a couple of houses were destroyed. The fire service did not have a water supply adequate to tackle those fires. It had loads of engines but it had to scutter to get a supply of water because it did not have sufficient pressure in the water system.

A government is supposed to look after all of the country, urban and rural. This Government and previous Governments have only looked after infrastructure within certain sectors where they want to be. All areas within 15 km of Limerick city are looking for investment. The Government has left out Askeaton, which has been waiting for a sewerage update for 43 years. Glin has been neglected. The Government is now proposing that those areas will be brought on line. I could also mention Oola. I can keep going around the county. Dromcolliher is another affected area. For years, the Government has promised to invest in infrastructure for those places.

The Government has destroyed Dublin by overpopulating it. You cannot get in or out of Dublin. People from Dublin cannot move home because of the excessive prices. Everything has been moved into the cities, which means nobody from Dublin can return home. What are those people doing? They are leaving the country. As is happening in every other place around the country, people are leaving. If the Government had invested in infrastructure around this country, we could have rebuilt towns and villages to make them sustainable for schools, businesses and sports. Everything would have been sustainable, which, in turn, would have made the business case for a proper transport network. The Government instead decided to put money into urban areas and forgot about the rest of the country. That has been a failure of the Government to date. It has failed in that regard.

Elections are looming in the next 12 months or less. There will be local authority and European elections, and the way I am reading the situation, the general election will follow shortly afterwards. Some 32% of candidates, both TDs and councillors, from the Government parties will not be running again. The writing is on the wall. It saddens me to see that in a democratic country such as Ireland. People in this country have finally realised the Government has not been looking after all of Ireland. It has only looked after a certain network of people who think the Government is right. The Cabinet has been too urban and has forgotten about the rest of the country. It has forgotten about most of the SMEs in this country. Small businesses employ 51% of the people in this country. The Government forgot about the parishes, villages and towns. It forgot about investment. If it had a proper business plan, the Government would represent all of Ireland but it has been overly city-based and has destroyed the country for everyone, including those in the cities. The Government has destroyed the cities through overpopulation. It has driven inflation through the roof and has forgotten about the people who put it where it is.

Michael McNamara (Clare, Independent)
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I would be loath to call a vote on a motion to recommit something to committee but I have two reservations I want to outline to the Minister of State and to the House. The first concerns the subject matter of the proposed amendments for which the Bill is being recommitted. Do I understand correctly that those amendments have almost nothing to do with the mayor of Limerick? Did somebody do a tour of the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage and ask if there was anything anyone wanted to get rid of? Was it a sort of jumble sale? Did somebody ask if there was anything anyone wanted to get rid of? Did people say they had matters to tidy up? There is a way to make law. I say to the civil servants in the House that, just as we expect everyone to respect the Constitution, it is important the Civil Service does too. Increasingly, this is a Civil Service that, perhaps because Fine Gael has been in government for so long, seems to think it can be taken for granted. This is not how to make legislation. If something urgent needs to be done, that is fine, and we can bring in legislation overnight or tack something on to the end of a Bill that has already passed through Committee Stage. We can recommit legislation and do it that way if the matter is urgent. However, I have not heard the Minister of State describe any pressing urgency to explain why we are doing it this way, other than to imply, "Sure, who cares? It is nearly Christmas and, sure, legislation, my arse." There has been claptrap about 1916 and how we should celebrate being able to make laws for ourselves. If this is how we do it, it is not very impressive of the Department. However, if there are Ministers who are willing to go along with it, that is fine. Lucky for them. Perhaps we will not always have Ministers but we probably will have, the way things are going.

I acknowledge the considerable amount of progress that has been made on this Bill since the Minister of State, Deputy O'Donnell, went into the Department, and the work his team has done to bring it to this point. It is important to acknowledge that an enormous amount of work has been done. It might be argued that a lot of work should have been done before that and one might question the delay in getting the legislation to this point. However, much work has been done and I congratulate the Minister of State for that. I acknowledge his commitment to delivering a directly elected mayor for the people of Limerick.

My other reservation also relates to the manner in which things are being done. We are told there will be a mayor of Limerick who will have executive powers. How executive will it be? There are certain powers that rest with the county managers as they were called, chief executives as they are now called, that will not be transferred to the new mayor of Limerick. It is appropriate that some powers will not be transferred, but there are a lot of them. Many are being introduced by amendment on Report Stage. We did not even discuss the powers that were being reserved on Committee Stage. The Minister of State and I were both present for Committee Stage and the explanatory memorandum did not set out what those powers were. I asked the Minister of State to compile a list, which he kindly did and provided to me. However, there is a whole load of new legislative proposals in the amendments submitted. If I am not mistaken, the Minister of State submitted 62 amendments, one of which is an amendment to the Schedule. There are 64 references to primary legislation and another 60-odd references to secondary legislation. It would be useful if we could set out what powers are referred to because otherwise it is difficult for the Dáil to debate them. It is, in fact, impossible for the Dáil to do so, given that those amendments were only submitted last Thursday and available to Deputies on Friday. There were a lot of them to consider before this week. I ask for that to be done and for some time to be allocated.

Nobody wants to filibuster and I accept that if a mayor of Limerick is to be elected at the next local elections, a Bill must pass through this House and the Upper House sooner rather than later so that preparations can take place. I accept that. Nevertheless, it is important we discuss the powers the mayor will have. There is no point in setting up the office of an elected mayor merely for the sake of it. The people were promised a mayor with executive powers. I accept the Minister of State's bona fides and congratulate him on the considerable amount of work he has put in. However, I also ask him and his civil servants to respect the House and give us the time to debate this legislation. I am not asking for time to filibuster or delay the Bill because that is not what I intend to do. However, there are questions that need to be asked, particularly about the príomh-chomhairleoir role, which seems to me extraordinary but is, nevertheless, being adopted. There is going to be a division of power between the director general, the speaker of the council, or príomh-chomhairleoir, and the new directly elected mayor. I have reservations about how it will work in practice as a result but I would like to tease out what is intended, how it will work and the rationale for some of the decisions to take away powers that the mayor of Limerick has as we speak from the new directly elected mayor. That raises questions and sufficient time should be provided to discuss them.

Perhaps now is the time to indicate that, under Standing Order 183, the Ceann Comhairle or committee chair - it does not explicitly refer to the Leas-Cheann Comhairle so I do not know if she has the power to do this - can direct that a new explanatory memorandum be provided.

That might take some time but a one-sentence list of what each statutory provision provides for would have been very useful and would still be very useful. I ask that one be provided in respect of the amendments the Minister of State is proposing to make. This practice of deeming all amendments tabled by the Minister to be passed and Report and Final Stages to be complete, with nobody debating anything, is not good. If there is a cock up then emergency legislation is brought through, in the way that the Minister of State is bringing this legislation now to fix previous cock ups. Out of curiosity, I wonder was the legislation brought through in the last week before Christmas. There was a particular tendency in the Department of the environment, local government and housing, which predates the Minister of State's arrival, to bring legislation through in the week before Christmas to avoid scrutiny. It is not a tendency of the Minister of State, Deputy O'Donnell; it predates him but there has been a lot of it in the lifetime of this Dáil and it is not a good practice. It is not something to be encouraged and above all, it is not democratic because there is no discussion and nobody even knows what they are voting on. These are my reservations but in principle I do not have problem with a recommittal to Committee.

Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent)
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I welcome the opportunity to speak on this Bill. One might ask what interest is a directly elected mayor for Limerick to me and what consequences it has for Galway and Galway East. I requested time to speak on this because while it sounds great to have a directly elected mayor, the functions of that mayor and the additional functions he or she will have compared to a Cathaoirleach of a local authority is relevant. Giving somebody authority and functionality is fine but will he or she have control over budgets? Therein lies the problem. Deputy Richard O'Donoghue referred to the lack of power of councillors to get devolved authority to make decisions within the local authority. This is clear when one looks at the way local area plans are developed in local authorities, for example. The forward planning section will bring forward a set of maps outlining what the local authority is going to do on the basis of certain principles. Councillors on the ground know that it is not going to work but they are coerced into agreeing to it because if they do not, it will go to the Office of the Planning Regulator who will then make recommendation to the Minister and the power will be taken away from councillors if they do not do what they are told. That is happening a lot in our local authorities. Often local area plans are zoning land for residential or other purposes that will never become available. This creates additional costs for construction by reducing the amount of land that is available. There is talk about increasing densities and all that goes with that but it is actually fairy tale stuff.

It is not the fault of the Minister of State. It predates him and I commend him on his efforts to get this Bill straightened out so that we can get it passed. The local authority structure as I knew it when I became a member of Galway County Council in 2004 has changed dramatically. We did not have active travel at that time. We had very little in the way of flood relief schemes or minor works schemes. They had just been brought in by the former Minister of State, Martin Mansergh, at that time. We did not have the urban or the rural regeneration funds, the town centre first scheme or the likes of the vacant property scheme, Croí Cónaithe. We have asked the local authorities to become the instrument by which these schemes are being delivered but have not resourced them properly to do that. Sometimes I get frustrated when I hear that a team has been set up to do active travel in a particular local authority. I wonder what that is all about and why it is not being done by the regional office. It creates a sense that there is a team there but the team might be one engineer or one part-time member of the administrative staff who is trying to do something for the entire county. We must be fair to ourselves and to the local authorities who are trying to administer all of these schemes, which are very good schemes, because they become very bad schemes when the people are not there to administer them. If a person has to wait six to 12 weeks for someone to come out to inspect a vacant property before it is approved for a grant, that is wrong. The scheme has failed that person who wants to get on with the work, move into the house and get out of a rental situation.

The fact of a directly elected mayor in Limerick is fine and dandy but if it is tokenism, we might as well put the Bill in the bin now and forget about it. How are we going to get the local authorities back to a situation where they have the resources to deliver what we are charging them with delivering? The other big issue is the pull between Irish Water and the local authorities in terms of delivering wastewater infrastructure. The local authorities are still being charged with doing feasibility studies for the new €50 million scheme that was announced by the Department last year. Local authorities are being asked to submit proposals and do feasibility studies for wastewater treatment plants but where is Irish Water? What is it doing? What is its role? What did it cost to set up Irish Water? What was the purpose of setting it up? If Irish Water is charged with delivering public water and wastewater infrastructure, it should be charged with delivering it to every rural village and town as well as to the large population centres. We need to get this right for once and for all because what we have at the moment is a tennis ball going back and forth between Irish Water and the local authorities. The local authorities are doing all of the work by way of feasibility studies and so on but they do not make the decision as to what works will be done.

Back in 2004, we had a works programme for wastewater treatment plants in our county. Some of these plants were past the feasibility stage and were ready to go to funding stage. Irish Water came along and the whole map was cleaned of all of these proposals and they still have not come back onto the list. What is the relationship between Irish Water and the local authorities? How are we going to get to a stage where one entity is responsible for the delivery of all wastewater and public water services? Otherwise we are just splitting, dividing and conquering and ending up in a situation where punters who want to build a house are finding it very frustrating because they do not know where to go to get relief. I had a case last week where a guy who wanted to build a house was told that he had to apply to Irish Water for a connection agreement and that it would take 26 weeks. He was also told that the local authority would have to be consulted too. Directly elected mayors will not help that because the system is wrong and we need to get it right. That said, I appreciate the efforts of the Minister of State.

Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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I thank the Minister of State for his opening statement. I apologise for being late but I was with departmental officials going through the fine detail of the Planning and Development Bill. My head is still a little bit sore from the two hours and 45 minutes of that session.

Normally at this time of the year I am standing over here railing against the Government for introducing very significant and consequential amendments to existing legislation that we do not have time to scrutinise. I am delighted not to be in that position today. The two amendments are very straightforward and simple and we have no objection to them being taken in this manner.

On that basis, we are more than happy to support the motion. Members can obviously scrutinise the amendments when they get to those sections of the Bill. I put on record that I welcome the fact that this year it is different and may this last long into the future.

Kieran O'Donnell (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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I do not think we need formally respond to the debate.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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I know that, but I have two different directions, one on screen and one written.

Kieran O'Donnell (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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I will respond briefly on one or two points. Deputy O'Donoghue referenced council staff. I will bring an amendment forward tomorrow, which relates to staff in the directly elected mayor's office. The mayor will be consulted on the appointment of those staff. I very much took on board what came up on Committee Stage.

Deputy McNamara referred to why we are bringing forward the amendment on local government. My Department only recently became aware of an issue with the consultation process required to be undertaken prior to declaring a qualification for a particular role in the local government sector. Having obtained legal advice, which concluded a legislative amendment was necessary, the Bill affords the opportunity to address the issue arising in a timely manner. As the Bill is the first Bill coming through, that is the reason behind that amendment.

Deputy Canney has left the Chamber, but we note the points he raised. We thank Deputy Ó Broin for his support.