Paudie Coffey (Fine Gael)

I welcome the Minister to the House. This Bill was debated at length in the other House this week and Senators now have an opportunity to consider it.

The Minister was at one time a member of a local authority and he would have in-depth knowledge of local government, as is the case with many Members of this House. I question whether he has considered all the implications of this legislation. There is a long tradition going back more than 100 years of local authorities working with central government and many informal lines of communication have proved valuable in the interaction between the bodies, county managers and public representatives. The Department of Transport will now be the lead Department.

Fine Gael welcomes any efficiencies which may be introduced into public administration but we are concerned with the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government handing over what are considered significant funds to the order of €1.5 billion, to the Department of Transport. This comes at a time when the Minister for Transport has displayed incompetence in the management of his brief, and this is not a personal criticism of the Minister. Deputy Noel Dempsey was Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government at the time of the electronic voting debacle and it is clear he was not on top of his brief when dealing with the Aer Lingus fiasco. I also refer to the recent U-turn on provisional driving licences.

Fine Gael is concerned as to how this fund will be administered by the Department of Transport. Public representatives from all parties will have similar concerns. The Department of Transport does not inspire confidence and the Minister may be making a mistake in handing over such autonomy to another Department.

I note the Exchequer grants for non-national roads have decreased by 39% this year. The amount invested last year was €87.5 million and it is proposed to invest only €54 million this year. This sends out the wrong signal to local authorities that central government is not willing to invest in non-national roads or to keep investment at a high level. Many of these roads are still of a poor standard of surface, alignments, junctions, signage and cat's eyes. Standards will suffer because of the decrease in funding. It would be important for the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government to remain in charge of this funding because of the long-standing traditional links between local authorities and the Department.

It is important that public representatives have access to the Department of Transport. Public representatives of all parties find it difficult to deal with the National Roads Authority and to be given answers to their inquiries. It seems the authority does not take into account the views of public representatives and local authorities. It dictates the management of national roads in many cases. I would hate to see the day a similar system operated for non-national roads because localised management is important. The Minister has assured the House that will not be affected in any way and that the Bill is only a technicality. However, I hope localised management of our non-national roads will not be detrimentally affected by the legislation.

Public representatives will be concerned about the proposed changes because of their potential impact on access to the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government and accountability. I hoped a system would be put in place by the Minister on the enactment of the legislation rather than handing over the disbursement of this significant sum to the Department of Transport.

I acknowledge the national vehicle driver file is a good mechanism, which must be welcomed, and I agree with the change in this regard, although a number of anomalies in the penalty points system have resulted. One in four of those who receive penalty points are immune because they hold out-of-state driving licences. A significant minority of drivers cannot be issued with penalty points because they do not have Irish driving licences. How will that fit in with the new system? The Automobile Association made a submission to the Department on the introduction of a parallel system of licensing whereby if penalty points are issued on an out-of-state licence, another licence in the name of the individual should run concurrently in this State, which would be charged with the relevant points. This issue needs to be addressed.

I refer to local government funding in general, an issue we will revisit, as it is on the agenda of every political party. Local authorities are given an unfunded mandate. They have a wide remit but they are not given the necessary resources to properly carry out their obligations and every councillor and city and county manager will attest to that. The issue of funding must be debated properly and a system must be devised under which local authorities are given autonomy to raise funds through their own measures or funds are provided by cental government. While this is a technical Bill, the Minister could have included serious proposals for the reformation of local government funding. It is a little premature to hand over a power the Department has managed well for many decades. Fine Gael has a difficulty with the legislation but we will not divide the House on it.