OPPOSITION MOVES to have the direct elections for Dublin mayor put on hold until the next local government poll in 2014, were rejected by a majority vote at the Oireachtas Committee on the Environment, Heritage and Local Government yesterday.
The legislation is now in its final stages and is expected to be passed into law shortly after the Dáil resumes in January, well within the general election deadline set by the Green Party.
Labour’s local government spokesman Ciarán Lynch said the promised White Paper on local government had still not been published and this meant there was no Government road map for reform.
Green Party leader and Minister for the Environment John Gormley said he was very proud of the mayoralty legislation and it was badly needed. He said the White Paper would be published before Christmas.
“The legislation we see before us today is the start of the real reform of local government,” Mr Gormley added. This was real decentralisation of the locus of power and should not be confused with sending “civil servants down the country”, he said.
Opposing Mr Lynch’s proposal, he said: “My fear is that the legislation will be dumped and all the hard work of my officials will come to naught.” However, the legislation provided for a review of his functions by the new mayor, who may discover there are areas that need to be changed.
“The idea of further postponement doesn’t serve any useful purpose,” Mr Gormley said.
Fine Gael local government spokesman Phil Hogan said the timing of the mayoralty legislation was bizarre, coming as it did at a time when national finances and the citizens of Dublin are under extreme pressure.
The new office of mayor was an expensive but powerless position, he said. Fine Gael would have much preferred to see proper devolution. He told the Minister: “You should have published the White Paper before this legislation.”
The new mayor would have no real power over transport or budgets, and no role in housing policy, Mr Hogan said.
