Brendan Kenneally (Fianna Fail)

I welcome this legislation which addresses long-overdue issues. For too many years we have taken the environment for granted and looked at the world around us as an unlimited resource capable of absorbing whatever battering we gave it. We know now that this is not the case and that too much damage has already been done, though thankfully not so much as to be irreversible. We are much more aware of the need to care for the environment and that it is sometimes the simple things we do which will have a long lasting effect on the quality of our way of life. Measures we take can range from protecting the air we breathe through the non-production of smoke and toxins to keeping our streets clean by ensuring our dogs do not spoil them. Such simple and common-sense measures would have been laughed at a decade or two ago but we have all grown to understand much more about our environment.

More controls have been introduced and, as a result of a programme of public education, much more is expected of everyone today. I congratulate the Minister on bringing forward the Bill at this stage, though there are certain sections about which I am not entirely happy. Section 19 deals with waste management plans, sufficient progress on which has been delayed for far too long. The matter is fraught with difficulty but in order to progress the Minister has decided to make the plans a management function, bypassing elected council members. While I understand his reasoning and agree that experience to date points to this action being the only way to make progress, I cannot but feel that it contravenes a sacred principle and represents a significant erosion of democratic practice. I understand the Minister's intent and the frustration from he and his predecessor have suffered which is the reason, with some reluctance, I support the measure. It is quite obvious that in many areas a variety of pressures have made councillors reluctant to make the hard decisions called for by a faltering environment. Accordingly, if power to decide must be taken from them and given to someone who will make the hard choices, so be it.

I do not agree, however, with the divesting of the power to decide waste management charges. The city or county manager will decide what the charges will be and authority members will have no power of veto. That is a total erosion of democracy as such decisions have traditionally been the exclusive preserve of elected members and we do not find ourselves in circumstances which warrant the change. I urge the Minister to review this element of the measure. This is not to suggest that city or county managers are reckless or lacking in understanding. My experience of them has been otherwise. However, we cannot see the future or what the next crop of managers will be like. The principle involved is one with which I do not agree. This is the first time there has been a departure from the traditional method of setting charges and rates. It is a dangerous precedent and an unnecessary departure. Will there be any need for Estimates meetings in the future if the manager is to do it all? Is this the first of a series of such decisions? Local authority members are answerable to the public and should be the ones who decide. While I do not wish to labour the point, I ask the Minister to review the section.