League table ‘does not scare city and county managers’
Environment Minister Dick Roche has signalled that he will publish the league table on the spending records of the country’s 39 city and county councils to show how each council performed in the past year.
The minister said local authorities must show that they are performing. “Local government is big business and it is far too important to be delivered in a slipshod or amateurish way,” he said.
The main reason for publishing the league table is to show city and county managers and council members how their particular local authority is performing, said the minister. The table will show who are the best and worst performers. But the City and County Managers Association (CCMA), which represents the local authorities managers, said yesterday that they were not worried about the publication of the league table.
CCMA chairman Des Mahon said local authorities will be the first in the public service to publish league tables that show their performance.
“The 49 indicators will show how we have been performing and we worked in partnership with the Department of the Environment to put this together,” said Mr Mahon.
Asked if the managers were afraid that the league table will show that some councils are not performing in their delivery of essential services like housing, Mr Mahon said: “The purpose of the league table is to improve performance and there are always resources problems.”
Asked if he was happy with the €817 million allocated to local authorities by the department for next year, Mr Mahon said there was always a demand for more resources.
“Most local authorities will have to cover wage increases in line with inflation and may be forced to increase their service charges.”
Many local authorities will be forced to increase service charges if the funding they get from Government does not cover their costs for next year, said Mr Mahon.
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