Fiach MacConghail (Independent)

That is not to say I am in favour of not amalgamating them but we should investigate it further.

According to the research paper I cited, bigger is not necessarily better and it is often sometimes worse. There is a weak relationship between population size and costs and service levels and efficiency. We cannot take it for granted, therefore, that by becoming larger, local authorities in Ireland would yield improvements.

One of the learnings we discovered at our regional meetings of We the Citizens was that citizens want local politics to be more local and for them to have a greater understanding and a stake in it. Raising local taxes and spending them locally was mentioned and discussed. Whatever reform the Oireachtas and Government come up with, this will be the crucial one. How can central government let go and devolve its power and revenue raising powers to local level? Participants in citizens assemblies were asked this question and were asked regarding the role of TDs, who they should be, what they should do and how they should represent citizens. The citizens assembly in June was asked to comment on the statement, "The ability of TDs to provide local service is strength", and the results of that were to place more weight after debate and the deliberative process on national legislative and policy and less on local service. The results showed a further marked and statistically significantly decrease in support for the statement. In other words, citizens understood that local politics, if more empowered and more enhanced, works better.

It is clear that the opportunity to discuss local government reform is an opportunity to evaluate our whole political culture and democracy. I look forward to engaging with the Minister in detail during this term of the Oireachtas. I urge him to include the voices of our citizens in any consultation on reform.