Town councils ‘best local government’, says report
It also suggests that local democracy could be destroyed through the abolition of town councils to achieve potential savings of just €6 million.
The study claims that town and borough councils are significantly less reliant on central government funding compared to city and county councils, yet are regularly targeted for exchequer cutbacks.
The report entitled “The Case for Town Local Government in Ireland in the 21st Century”, was carried out by researchers at University College Cork on behalf of the Association of Municipal Authorities of Ireland (AMAI).
The AMAI claims its findings show that the role of town councils within the system of local government should be enhanced rather than threatened with financial cutbacks.
The report points out that the more successful economies in the developed world all have a vibrant system of town government at the heart of their public administration systems.
“Town councils are an easy target when central government is looking to rationalise,” the report states.
“Disappointingly, the McCarthy Report and the Efficiency Review Group provide little or no evidence to support their dubious assertions about town councils.”
The report suggested a major rationalisation of local authority structures by abolishing town councils and regional authorities and reducing the existing 34 city and county councils to just 22 local authorities.
However, the AMAI acknowledges that town councils are in need of urgent reform, but it argues that any changes should be introduced in the context of a radical overhaul of the entire local government system.
“Ireland needs a more comprehensive tier of town or community government covering the entire country. Currently we have too few town councils and quite often they carry the can for the ineffectiveness of county councils,” said the AMAI.
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