Paul Bradford (Independent) | Oireachtas source

That there is no point in my shooting the messenger. I know the Minister of State, Deputy Hayes, is speaking on behalf of the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government. The script represents the biggest U-turn I have heard in a long time. Clear indications were given in print and oral interviews at the weekend that consideration was being given to having town councils restored.

I am keen to raise one point with the Minister of State, although I imagine he is very much aware of it given that he comes from a large geographical county. I wish to emphasise the importance of local government being local. The Minister of State remarked in his reply - the script was provided by the office of the Minister, Deputy Kelly - that there was an affinity among the people within municipal districts. The Minister of State should consider County Cork. He need not tell me that he could possibly believe people outside Charleville, on the Limerick border, have any sort of political or geographical affinity with the people of the parishes of Conna and Ballynoe, near Tallow, County Waterford, yet, they are part of a single municipal district. Certainly, I do not believe the people of Millstreet and the surrounding area have any political affinity to the Mallow municipal district in the centre. What about the areas in west Cork that are 60, 70 or 80 miles away? A former councillor, Dermot Sheehan, known to all of us through his father, remarked to me after the local elections that it would have been as easy for him to represent the congressional district of New York as the huge sprawling area where he had to contest the election. We have got it fundamentally wrong.

I find it ironic and I am sorry the Minister, Deputy Kelly, is not in the House. The politics of stitching up these municipal authorities last year into eight, nine and ten-seaters was to save the party that lost all the seats. That is the ultimate irony. Leaving aside politics, the people need good strong local democracy. The town councils were not perfect but they had and have a role to play. I hope that long before the next local elections there will be a serious dialogue again about the need to restore genuine real local government whereby local actually means local.