Minister for the Environment John Gormley has told city and county councillors that he will give them more powers in the upcoming Green Paper on Local Government Reform if they can deliver greater accountability in decision making. Olivia Kellyreports.
Speaking at the annual lunch of the Local Authorities Member Associations, Mr Gormley said that as a former councillor he was a "strong advocate" of local government and in democratically elected local representatives having the power to effect real change for their constituents.
The power of councillors has been diminished in recent years, particularly in relation to waste management. Decisions such as setting waste charges and planning waste infrastructure are now the sole responsibility of city and county managers, following the failure of councillors to agree to introduce bin charges.
Mr Gormley said it was his basic philosophy that councillors should be empowered, but, he added: "this creates a dilemma where things go wrong".
However, he said he was not convinced that the solution was to remove councillors' powers. "The temptation sometimes in the past had been to take power away from democratic structures in order to overcome difficulties," he said.
"I am not convinced that democratic powers should be handed over to non-elected bodies, or officials without good reason. I consider that that approach is fundamentally damaging to democracy in the long term," he said to the sustained applause of councillors.
The solution was he said to strengthen democratic accountability and leadership and arrive at better ways of dealing with conflict between management and councillors. There was a collective responsibility to pursue the common ground where it was possible, but to act in an open, rational way where it was not.
"This is the philosophy which underpins my approach to the Green Paper on Local Government Reform. It goes to the heart of providing greater democratic leadership - while in return expecting greater clarity and accountability in decision making."
Mr Gormley said he wanted to give councillors more power as long as they realised that national and EU laws must be respected.
"In some areas there are national policies and EU laws which local government must comply with. That is not an option, or a demand - that is a reality."