Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)

I welcome the Minister of State and I thank him for his time today. Like other Members, I very proudly served as a local authority member. I spent 16 years on Kilkenny Corporation – that is what I call it – and then Kilkenny County Council after another Kilkenny man decided in 2014 to abolish it, unfortunately. This is the premise of some of the other contributions. Kilkenny had a unique place in Irish history. The first minutes of Kilkenny Corporation date back to 1231, to the Liber Primus Kilkenniensis, and Kilkenny was granted city status by charter in 1609. The abolition was detrimental to the urban authority. While not wanting to look back, when we look at the important future challenges facing local government, such as climate action, the nature restoration plan, active travel, public transport, community policing, sustainable drainage systems, nature-based solutions and all of these broad, big issues with which local authority members must grapple, we need that dedicated tier of urban authority, and a network of them. It is important that once you are part of that network, you are part of a European network that can be tapped into for sharing projects and best practice.

The issue of directly elected mayors has been mentioned. We cannot row back on the commitment. It is working well in Limerick. With regard to the Minister of State’s role, we need to have a directly elected mayor in our capital city. That is absolutely vital. That issue needs to be dealt with by this task force. We need to grapple with that. Currently, our town hall has been ripped out for a tourist attraction. What happens if we decide to reinstate the city council? It is just so unfortunate. We must look at that. Each local authority needs to have in place a dedicated EU unit where it can tap into EU partnership projects and funding.