Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

Section 22(7)(b)(vi) provides that in considering whether to appoint a person to be a director of a transferred company, the local authority chief executive concerned shall have regard to the desirability of experience of local government. However, we have ensured that those with the greatest experience of local government are excluded. We will be talking about that a little later in the Bill again. I cannot for the life of me see why. One could have two brothers, one of whom is a local authority employee while the other is a local authority representative. The employee is eligible for appointment to the board while the elected representative is not. There is a great deal of disquiet about this among local authority members and I have not heard the Minister address it specifically. He has had wide consultation with IBEC, ICTU and others, but I have not heard him say he has addressed all the local authority members.