Jim Walsh (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I concur with what has been said by Senators Wilson and Cullinane in regard to this issue. I like many others here have served within the local government system, on both town councils, or urban district councils as they were, and county councils. The experience of many who served in that dual capacity would be that where town councils were properly empowered, they were an effective and efficient organ of the governance system.

The county councils always had a tendency to assume the powers of the urban district councils. Now the Department is assuming powers that the county councils should have. It is small-scale empire building, in which nobody wants to cede power but in consequence the system is totally centralised.

Does it serve the people well that there are town councils in 15 towns with a population of fewer than 2,000 while several with a population over 10,000 do not? No. The solution is not to abolish them all but to ensure that those with a population in excess of 10,000 are given the status of a town council, with appropriate powers.

Why do residents living inside a boundary line have a town council, while those in the suburbs of the same town, but outside an outdated boundary, must deal with the county council? That arose out of changes made in 1994 in the run-up to town council elections when arbitrary boundaries were set. Unfortunately, many people in my town, and I am sure elsewhere, who wanted to play their part, to exercise their franchise, were deprived of the possibility of doing so. That was not done by the councils but by the Department of the Environment and the Minister of the day. Within the past 19 years there has been no attempt to rectify it although it could easily have been rectified.