Rose Conway Walsh (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Sinn Féin agrees with the motion to set up the time-limited committee. We recognise that Putting People First and the changes in local government have not served constituents, their councillors or local authorities. Money was saved by getting rid of town councils, but it was a major mistake, not only for the towns that they served, but for the public representatives. I have just left a constituency in west Mayo that is 100 miles long and includes a number of large towns. There is no way for me to give a quality service in a constituency of that size.

Local councillors need the resources to do their jobs. It is more than a full-time job. We all bring our experiences to it. I did not realise that Senator Paddy Burke had been a councillor for 25 years before me. We all know what we put into that job when we did it.

There must be fixed-term contracts with the associated benefits. Some people believe that councillors should do the job for nothing, but one cannot do so with no resources. My main concern is that someone who is parenting alone or has responsibilities and who could bring good experience to a council chamber is forbidden from doing so because it is financially unaffordable for him or her to leave a family in a vulnerable situation and work so many hours. People are unable to take up extra employment or pay their bills at the end of the month. We need people from all cross-sections of the community in our council chambers, for example, lone parents, people who have experienced poverty, people who have run businesses, etc. These are the types of persons who make good decisions on behalf of the people.

When we treat councillors as we have been doing, we feed into the centralisation of power in the Government and county managers. The latter are running the show in local authorities. That is not right. Reserved functions are being continuously eroded. Is that any wonder when we treat councillors like we do? We must be able to encourage a cross-section of society into local government, but we can only do that by looking after the welfare and terms and conditions of our councillors. We must work together in that regard. I look forward to working with the committee, but it must be time-limited and produce results for councillors and the constituents whom they serve.