Private Deputies' Business. - Local Government Administration—Motion (Resumed). – Dáil Éireann (12th Dáil) – Thursday, 21 Sep 1944

Private Deputies' Business. - Local Government Administration—Motion (Resumed).

Mr. O'Leary

I feel as a public representative, as chairman of an urban council, and as a member of other local bodies that I cannot let the present opportunity pass without giving expression to what I think, and what the majority of the people think, of the County Management Act. Strange to say, when the Fianna Fáil Party held a majority on the county councils there was no need for a County Management Act, but in the elections of 1942 prominent speakers of the Fianna Fáil Party said in my own town, when they knew that the ground was slipping from under them, that no matter who would be elected, the county manager would be the boss. We hear a lot of talk about corruption but, as far as I see, this County Management Act was introduced solely to give the supporters of Fianna Fáil big jobs at the expense of the ratepayers. There are some members who agree with the County Management Act, like Deputy Dr. O'Higgins, who is a medical officer of health, and who is under the whip of the county manager.

An Ceann Comhairle

That does not arise.

Mr. O'Leary

Those people will agree with the Act. The Fine Gael Party voted with the Government for the Act and, therefore, they cannot condemn it, but we who represent the working-class people know well enough that the people are handicapped and that public representatives are handicapped to a very large extent by the Act. Take the case of the mental hospital committee in my own town. What happens there? The meeting is held on a fair day. The farmer members on that day come into town, sell their cattle, go down to the mental hospital, have their tea and a smoke, go home and get their travelling allowances. That is going on month after month. If, on the other hand, you look for home assistance for people whom you know to be genuine cases, when you go to the home assistance officer he says: "That must be submitted to the county manager." These poor people must go without assistance until the county manager thinks well to consider their cases a fortnight or a month afterwards. That is what the people I represent are getting under the County Management Act.

Again, the allocation of cottages in Wexford under the managerial system has been a scandal. Cottages in rural areas that were built for agricultural labourers were given to people in an urban area who were not agricultural labourers at all, simply because they were supporters of the Fianna Fáil Party. When I brought the matter up at the county council I was told that I had no voice in the matter, that it was an executive function. If a councillor raises a question of the wages paid to quarry workers or road workers under the county council the county manager says: "That is an executive function; you have no voice in it." I suggest to the Minister that if the Act is not scrapped—and I would not be satisfied with any amendment of it; I think it should be completely scrapped—he should scrap all committees, county councils, urban councils, visiting committees to mental hospitals and all other such committees, so as to save the ratepayers the expense of paying travelling allowances of members who have nothing to do.

The Parliamentary Secretary said last night that some local bodies were greatly in favour of the Act. Who are they? They are supporters of the Fianna Fáil Party. Take County Wexford, for instance. The county manager during the emergency, when many people were greatly in need of home assistance, came along with a scheme to sow apple trees along the public road and the Fianna Fáil members said it was a grand scheme. Under that scheme it was proposed to spend £500 of the ratepayers' money for ten years to sow apple trees along the public road. At the same time I was fighting the county manager to give back to people who had no other means, relief that was taken from them. I say that that can be proved by the reports in the local papers of the debates at the Enniscorthy Urban Council and the county council. I say if there was any corruption, the corruption was carried out when Fianna Fáil had a majority on the urban councils and the county councils, because no one got jobs except members of Fianna Fáil clubs. Nobody else need apply.

I would ask the Minister when did the people give him a mandate to appoint county managers at big salaries? After the local elections of 1942 everyone in Wexford knew who the county manager was going to be, and in other counties as well. The jobs were already made. When the administration was carried on without any county manager everything was all right, but when the Fianna Fáil term of office had expired they said there was need for a manager. Why? Because they were a corrupt Party. They gave members of their own Party all the jobs that were going. If a member of the committee goes down to the mental hospital in Enniscorthy he cannot interview an attendant, man or woman, but he can talk as much as he likes to the patients. You can talk to them about their complaints but dare you interview the attendants employed there. That is a question for the manager.

The Minister for Local Government and Public Health knows Enniscorthy as well as I do. He spent some time there years ago. We have a sanatorium there. A doctor, rather than live near the institution, left the town to take, we were told, a bigger job in England. I believe he left because we were compelling him, through the Minister, to live near the institution. You have that kind of thing happening. When I go to Wexford I report cottages that are in need of repairs. We have a whole crowd of engineers there, and now we have got another one to mark out the additional half-acres for cottages. Day after day and week after week the members of the county council are getting letters complaining of the state of the cottages and making other complaints as well. Nothing is being done. We were told that under the County Management Act there would be great savings. I say there would have been great savings if the Act had never been put into force, because then the £20 or £25 that is going to the manager could have been given to the poor people who are being cut off home assistance. One can go to the relieving officer, but if you are not a Fianna Fáil member you will get no "say". He will tell you "Oh, I cannot do anything about that, I will have to report it to the manager and to the superintending home assistance officer." The people who are giving out home assistance in the County Wexford can get sheep dipping jobs; they are warble fly inspectors and all the rest, even though they cannot wait on the poor people they are paid to look after.

This Act should be scrapped. If not, there will be no local elections next year. Why spend money on local elections and bring people to the polling booths if, when they are elected and ask that something be done, they are told "that is an executive function"? Every member of a local body present in the House knows that is true. Members of local bodies have no power under the County Management Act. Why did Fianna Fáil bring in this Act in 1942? Why did they not bring it in when they had a majority on the county councils and the county boards of health? For years they looked on and everything was all right.

It was only in 1942 that the Minister appointed his county managers and put big expense on the ratepayers. I say: "If you want to do justice to the people that we represent, scrap us, save what goes in travelling expenses, and give it to the people who need it." I would prefer that any day to what we have at present. I do not care who the county manager is, he cannot get to know the needs of the people as well as local representatives. If you are not going to scrap this Act and give back to the people the power that they had, then there is no use in having local elections next year. I ask that to be done in the interests of the plain people. Why fool the people by asking them to vote for any Party at the local elections when the elected representatives can afterwards be told by the county manager that such and such a thing is an executive function? That happens. Members of local bodies are told that they have no powers. When a member asks that something be done, and is told that, he is laughed at by some members of the council who agree with the County Management Act. I do not care what the Parliamentary Secretary said last night, I cannot find anyone in touch with local affairs who is in favour of this Act. Why have all this unnecessary expense of county managers? It was said here last night that they are great savers. They would want to save a lot to make their own salaries. I refused to sign the rate books in Enniscorthy when the county manager did not appear. That is the one time when he should be there, and that is the only time— the striking of the rate—that we have any power. After you strike the rate you have no more power. The county managers can spend the money then any way they like.

I am sure Deputies read the reports in the newspapers of what took place in the City Hail last week. All Parties were represented there. At that meeting there, Fianna Fáil members admitted that they would not have voted for this Act if they knew at the time that they could not do various things. They found that out too late. The Fine Gael Party, of course, will back up this Act. I do not mind Deputy O'Higgins or any other member of that Party backing it up, because they voted for it. They want now to give it another trial. Will the Minister put on the Table something to show what saving there has been since this Act was passed, or what improvement there has been in the conditions of the people? In conclusion, I ask the Minister to scrap this Act, or if not, to scrap all the public bodies. He has already dissolved some because, I suppose, they did not agree with this Act. I ask the Minister on behalf of the people that I represent—the working-class people and ratepayers in County Wexford—to save the rates and scrap all the public bodies in the County Wexford, because we are of no further use to the people that we represent.

Minister for Local Government and Public Health (Mr. MacEntee)

I had not intended to intervene at this stage of the debate because, after the excellent and thoughtful speech of the Parliamentary Secretary last night, it did not seem to me that it was necessary that I should say more than a very few words, but the Deputy who has just sat down has made one or two statements which, I think, I should deal with now when they are fresh in the minds of Deputies. He has stated that there was no thought of introducing county management when Fianna Fáil had a majority on the county councils. I suppose most of the members of the House were in public life in 1934. I suppose Deputy O'Leary himself was in public life at that time. The Deputy will remember that, at the local elections on that occasion, the Fianna Fáil Party practically swept the boards. The councils which were elected then remained in office until 1942. There was a reason for that. A general election took place in 1937 at which, amongst other issues, the Constitution under which we now live was put before the people. It has been the custom—I think it is wise procedure— not to hold local government elections in a year in which a general election is plainly inevitable. It happened that the statutory term of the councils elected in 1934 expired in 1937. The elections should have been held that year but, apart from the consideration that a general election was to take place in that year, there was the fact that the Government was contemplating the application of the managerial principle to county administration. The elections were, accordingly, postponed. In 1938, the elections were again postponed and, on this occasion, the ground for the postponement definitely was that the Government had in contemplation the introduction of the managerial principle to county administration. It was considered undesirable that the elections should be held before the Dáil had an opportunity of considering the proposals of the Government in that regard.

In due course, those proposals were submitted to the Dáil. If my recollection does not mislead me, the Bill was introduced in the year 1939 and became law in 1940. Every member of the county councils in 1940 knew that the management principle was to be applied to local authorities, generally, throughout the country. It had already been applied to the county boroughs and, at least, to one borough. The members of the county councils were not ignorant that the county management principle was about to be introduced. I am sure that members of local authorities who were also members of the Dáil took advantage of the discussion of the Bill in the House to elicit the views and opinions of their colleagues upon local bodies who were not members of the Dáil. I have no doubt that they made proper representations here in respect of those views.

That was the position. Yet, Deputy O'Leary, in the ill-considered speech to which we have just listened—I am sorry I have to describe the speech in those terms—said that there was no thought of introducing county management until the Government Party had lost its majority on the county councils. When he considers all the facts which I have put before him, I am sure the Deputy will admit that his speech was ill-founded and ill-considered.

If what I have said does not carry conviction to Deputy O'Leary's mind, I remind him that one of the reasons why I held that it was desirable to hold the elections, even in the circumstances which prevailed, in 1942, was that I was anxious to give effect to the County Management Act, which had become law and the operation of which had been suspended while we were drafting the necessary regulations and making the necessary preparations. When the elections were announced, everybody knew that, simultaneously with the coming into office of the new bodies, the remaining provisions of the County Management Act, which had been held up pending those elections, would be put in force and that the whole corpus of the statute would be applied to the local authorities, generally. Those are the facts. Yet, with those facts in mind, Deputy O'Leary has made the type of speech to which we have just listened.

Mr. Allen

He was told that four years ago.

Mr. MacEntee

The type of speech made by Deputy O'Leary is not going to help us. Neither will it help us to suggest, as the Deputy has suggested, that, in some way or other, the present county manager in Wexford secured his appointment because he was supposed to be friendly to the Government. I do not know what the gentleman's politics are. I know that he has been a good nationalist. He was a colleague of mine in Richmond Prison in 1916. Beyond that, I have no idea of what his political views are. I do know that the Dáil, because, amongst other things, of the difficulty of finding men capable of taking the posts and because county secretaries and other senior officials of the local authorities had claims in equity to prior consideration in the appointment of county managers, decided that existing county secretaries and secretaries of boards of health would secure the appointments if the Local Appointments Commission—not the Minister—considered them to be qualified and suitable. It is because the Local Appointments Commission—a body independent of the Minister— decided that this gentleman in Wexford—who, I think everybody admits, is an excellent official—was qualified and suitable for the post that he was made county manager. Those are two serious mis-statements for which Deputy O'Leary was responsible and, when he reads what I have said just now, I think that he will be sorry he made the type of speech he did make. It was not a helpful or useful contribution.

In this matter of local administration we are faced with a very difficult problem and I endorse what the Parliamentary Secretary has said to the House regarding it. We, in the Government—and I, particularly, as Minister for Local Government—are approaching this problem in an experimental frame of mind. While we are prepared to say that we are not rigidly tied down to every detail of the County Management Act, as it stands at the moment, we have the firm conviction that it is not in the local interest nor in the national interest that we should revert to the position which obtained prior to the introduction of that Act— a position which was very well described in the debates here by an old and experienced ex-member of this House who had served here for ten or 12 years and who had served, I think, as chairman of a county council for some time. I refer to Mr. Michael Brennan, who was formerly a member of the Opposition. Here is what he said in 1939 on the Second Stage of the County Management Act:

"What I have always felt about the position is that at the present time local authorities are hopelessly overloaded with work. I do not think that the Bill that is before the House is going to be ideal. I do not think that it is going to be perfect."

None of us contends that it is either ideal or perfect but we say that it is an honest attempt to find a solution for a very difficult problem. We think that it offers the fairest prospect for a solution, and that the solution, when it is found, will differ only in accidents, and not in essence, from the one we have embodied in the Act. He continued:

"I do not think that the Bill that is before the House is going to be ideal. I do not think that it is going to be perfect, but I do think it is going to give us a better and more efficient machine for dealing with local government. I do not at all agree that the Bill is taking away local government. As far as I am concerned, I have not any desire to appoint officials. I would be very glad to see somebody attending to the work, determining what shall be paid to the officials and where they shall be put in their particular offices. I do not want to do it and I think I have as much and as close experience of local authority work as any member in this House."

Any person who has been in the unfortunate position of having had to decide which one of nine or ten individuals is to get a particular appointment will feel exactly the same as ex-Deputy Brennan felt in regard to this matter. He proceeded:—

"In regard to the board of health, I am a member of the board of health in Roscommon. Deputy Murphy has mentioned certain matters that ought to be attended to by the Department of Local Government, such as more attention to the poor, the segregation of different parties and so on. I entirely agree with Deputy Murphy in that. That ought to be done, and that is one of the reasons why I am backing the Bill. We cannot do it. Ten laymen, meeting once a fortnight to consider 40, 50 or 60 items in four or five hours on a Saturday afternoon, are not able to do that. We try as best we can to do it. In order to finish the work, when it comes to seven or eight o'clock in the evening, after sitting possibly for six or seven hours, I have often seen the work being parcelled out to members. That is not efficient administration. You cannot have efficiency in that way. If Deputy Norton or the Labour Party believe that this Bill is taking away all the democratic principles we had in local authorities, they have not shown it. Nobody has shown it."

We approach this problem with the conviction that the position which ex-Deputy Brennan described, and which we all know to have existed in every local body, cannot be allowed to obtain again. Local government has become so complex and so vast that we had to find some way of ensuring that local services, which are so costly, not only to local ratepayers but also to the State, would be administered expeditiously, effectively, and efficiently. We have tried to do that. We have tried to secure efficient administration and, at the same time, to safeguard democratic principles. We have done it by means that are very similar to those which have been evolved in the administration of national affairs. We have taken pains in the County Management Act to ensure that the elected bodies will be the policy-making authorities in local affairs, within, of course, the limits that the general law of the land allows. We have made certain that within the limits imposed by law upon the elected body, they will be the paramount financial authority. We have generally imposed on the elected body the duty of supervising the actions and the administration of county managers. That is why we have embodied in the Act a provision so that the elected body can, by a majority, require a county manager to make a full report, and a full disclosure of all information and all facts in his possession relating to any transaction of a local authority by which he is engaged.

Of course we have been very careful to ensure that the county manager's authority over the officers and employees of local authorities remains unchallenged. That is because we feel that unless a man is able to deal with his subordinates in a way which appears to be just and reasonable—there being also an appeal to the Minister—which will ensure that they will fulfil their duties and obligations, we could not hold him responsible for the general administration of local affairs. Now I felt originally I had to intervene to-night because I listened with some astonishment to a statement made by Deputy O'Sullivan when moving this resolution. He said that the system of local government is doing more harm than good, that the practice of making a report to the council had disappeared entirely; and that the whole system of local administration was an absolute failure. The statement, particularly that about making a report to the council, was so striking that I had the matter investigated. I do not know whether Deputy O'Sullivan and I talk the same language, but I have here a very full report made to the Housing Committee of Dublin Corporation, which happens to be signed by Deputy James Larkin as chairman. That report consists of 21 paragraphs, and contains information supplied by the city manager.

Mr. Corish

Will a vote be taken before 7 p.m.

An Ceann Comhairle

At 7 p.m.

Mr. MacEntee

I wish to be granted the indulgence of another couple of minutes to deal with this matter. I have here another report addressed to the chairman and members of the general purposes committee. This one is signed by the city manager, and in view of what has been said here as to the futility and powerlessness of members of elected bodies, I think it right to read one paragraph:

"I have to refer to the following motion passed by the city council on the 7th February, 1944, viz.:—

"That the city manager be requested to furnish to the council particulars of schemes that have been considered or decided upon as suitable for carrying out in the difficult post-war period, and how these are to be financed."

There is a resolution passed by the Corporation of Dublin, the elected body in this case, asking the city manager to report. He gives a very full report, and much detailed information. No doubt the corporation could have had more information if they asked for it. The council accepted the report, and made no further comment except to congratulate the city manager on it.

Having received that report and having considered it, they could have expressed dissatisfaction if they felt it was necessary to do so. They could have asked for further information, for further details about any one of these schemes, and if they had been dissatisfied with the conduct of the manager in relation to it, they could have passed a resolution and could have drawn the attention of the Minister to it. If necessary, they could have gone further and, in the last resort, could have passed a resolution suspending the manager.

But perhaps there may be a reason why we do not get these reports now. I have before me some account of the matters considered at meetings of the various committees which the Dublin Corporation has set up to deal with its business. There is a General Purposes Committee, a Housing Committee and a Finance Sub-Committee and I have seen some of the matters considered by the General Purposes Committee. These matters are considered in detail by that committee and a report is furnished to the corporation which, in due course, considers it. Looking at some of the agenda of meetings of the Dublin Corporation, I find that they are very comprehensive. Not merely are there reports of the corporation committees there, but I find numerous resolutions and if these resolutions which are put down by members of the corporation and to which, presumably, those who put them down attach very great importance, are to be considered at all, I do not see how any very extensive report from the city manager could be considered on the same evening. However, I have trespassed far enough on Deputy Corish's time. I am grateful to him for the few extra minutes he has given me.

Mr. Corish

We have listened to a very interesting debate on the County Management Act, and I am rather glad that both the Minister and the Parliamentary Secretary took part in it. May I say without disrespect that I think the statements of both the Minister and the Parliamentary Secretary were rather of an academic nature. They made no effort to examine the position as it confronts the country to-day, and especially the members of local authorities. The Minister, in answer to Deputy O'Leary, said that the County Management Act became law in 1940 and that all councillors knew that. They certainly knew the Act had become law, but I venture to suggest that not one of those who offered themselves for election two years ago was aware of the drastic provisions of the Act. I must confess that I sat in the House during the whole period when the Bill was going through and with my Party fought every line of it. We moved a large number of amendments, but I myself was not aware that the provisions of the Act were so drastic until after the elections were held in 1942. I have met men, members of this House, who voted for the Bill who have confessed to me that they were not aware of its drastic provisions when it was going through.

The Minister has had an altercation with the mover of the resolution, Deputy O'Sullivan, in connection with the matter of reports submitted to the Dublin Corporation. I should like to ask the Minister of what use are these reports? The reports made to the various councils, when county managers do submit reports, are reports of matters which might be considered to be faits accomplis. The action is already done and the council have no control, good, bad or indifferent, over the actions of the manager, with the result that, where reports are submitted, in a great many cases very little notice is taken of them, because the moment anybody questions them, as Deputy O'Leary says, the chairman tells him it is a function of the county manager and he has no right either to discuss or deal with it.

I should like to ask the Minister if it is right, from the point of view of absolute democracy, that one person should have the right of veto over the elected representatives of the people, because that is the position? We are told that we have control over the finances of the council, and we are told that we have the right to strike the rate for the ensuing year. We have, but I suggest that we have not got complete control so far as finance and the striking of the rate are concerned. If the manager submits an estimate and the members of a council argue that, in their opinion, so much money should not be spent on such a thing, and if the county manager remains adamant, he appeals to the Minister, and in every case since the County Management Act came into operation the Minister has threatened mandamus proceedings against the council concerned, if it will not agree to strike the necessary rate.

I have to refer only to the case of the Roscommon County Council. I am not concerned at the moment with why they wanted to cut the amount down; I am speaking merely of the fact. During the debate on the Minister's Estimate, the Minister went so far as to say that in the future, if anything like that happened, he will not set up machinery for an inquiry, but, under the Emergency Powers Act, will immediately proceed to abolish the council. There, to my mind, are the powers which county councils and urban councils have.

I listened with very great interest and very carefully to the Parliamentary Secretary, and, again, without disrespect, I want to say it was quite obvious to everybody that he had no knowledge whatever of the work of public bodies, that he had not the slightest idea of what he was talking about so far as the activities of public bodies are concerned. It was, to my mind, a speech similar to one which might have been made by a Conservative member of the British House of Commons when the Irish Parliamentary Party were looking for Home Rule. He said he took exception to the phraseology of the motion moved by Deputy O'Sullivan. He disagreed with the terms of the motion where it says: "...reveal a distinct departure from democratic principles." I want to emphasise that particular phrase in the motion that stands in the names of members of the Labour Party.

He stated that it was only in the year 1897—I think it was 1898, as a matter of fact—that democracy, in so far as elections to county councils and other local authorities were concerned, came to this country; that it was only then county councils were elected on a purely democratic franchise. That may be so—it is so, as a matter of fact. I think it is a rather unfortunate thing to find that that democracy, which was given to us by an alien government, with a king at its head, was taken from us by a Government which calls itself a Republican Government. I want to be quite calm in this matter and I am not saying that in any disrespectful way or for a political purpose; but really is the situation not Gilbertian, to say the least of it, when we remember all the outbursts from the Fianna Fáil Party about democracy? I remember well, when the Limerick City Management Bill was going through the House, some members now on the Government Front Bench getting into a white heat in condemnation of that Bill. I remember well the strong words used by the present Minister for Finance against the anti-democratic policy of the Government of the time. I venture to say that the present Minister for Finance knows more about local government than any other individual on the Government Front Bench, and I cannot understand what brought about the change.

The Parliamentary Secretary mentioned that I was a member of the Greater Dublin Commission. I was, and I signed a minority report. I remember well during the sittings of that commission when the question of management was mentioned that what the members, so far as I can recollect, visualised was a manager elected by the council with the same relationship existing between them as between a board of directors and their managing director. I certainly visualised a manager handling the day-to-day routine matters of the council and consulting the council regularly with regard to matters of policy and being guided and advised by the council.

No matter what the Minister or the Parliamentary Secretary may say, there is very little in public life to-day to interest members, especially the younger members. The time of county councils and corporations and urban councils at the moment is taken up by resolutions dealing with matters extraneous to the work of local authorities. Time and time again at county council and urban council meetings we have resolutions calling for an increase in old age pensions or reductions in the price of turf, and matters of that kind. These resolutions are introduced in order to create an interest at the meeting of a particular county council or corporation.

The Parliamentary Secretary said yesterday that we had a right to deal with housing, the erection of bridges, and sanitation. I do not think we have. We may have the right to say to the county manager: "We believe that you should proceed with the erection of so many houses in a certain place," but when we say that and ask the manager to initiate a scheme, there we stop. We are not permitted to have anything further to do with the housing scheme. We are not permitted to examine the tenders that come in; we are not permitted, when the houses are built, to fix the rent. As the Minister knows, in the old days when houses were built and when it was found that the rent would be too high, councils were in favour of giving, and usually did give, a subsidy in order to reduce the rent to an economic level, but under the present conditions we are not permitted even to discuss that aspect. We tell the manager to initiate a housing scheme, the manager proceeds to get plans and request tenders, the tenders are examined by him and he, in his wisdom or otherwise, accepts the lowest tender and we hear nothing more about that scheme.

So far as sanitation is concerned, it was always very interesting at a public board to receive a sanitary officer's complaint about cases in particular areas. Now a council does not know a blessed thing about what is going on so far as sanitation is concerned. Surely it is not too much to ask that matters of that kind ought to be the function of a local authority? The position is that a person sends in a complaint to the council and it is sent to the county manager. The ordinary member of the council does not know a blessed thing about it. He may be met by an individual in the street and asked about the matter and he has to confess that he has not seen the letter and does not know anything about it, even though it is a major matter so far as a particular district is concerned. If a decision is arrived at by the county manager, a letter is sent out to the person or firm concerned, as the case may be, in these terms: "I am directed by the corporation (or the county council, as the case may be) to refer to your letter ..." He is not directed by any corporation or county council, unless the county manager is to be called the county council or the corporation, for the purpose of the Act. These are the things we are up against.

As regards home help, is it suggested that one person, and that person the relieving officer, even though there is a county manager there, is the person to determine whether an unfortunate individual has to get home help or not? We all know the care taken by the county health boards to investigate cases that come before them. I wonder would it be too much to ask the House to allow me another five minutes in which to conclude my speech?

Mr. MacEntee

No objection.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy may continue until five minutes past seven o'clock.

Mr. Corish

All those cases were examined very carefully by county health boards and care was taken to secure that the proper people were given home help. Now it is left to one person to determine whether an applicant is or is not entitled to home help. In a great many cases the applicant is not treated fairly. I think anybody who is a member of a county council will have to agree with that. Deputy O'Leary knows that our county council has asked on three or four occasions since the County Management Act came into operation that the county manager should agree to set up a committee to deal with home help applicants, and up to the present we have not been successful. If the manager is a sensible man he ought to agree to a proposal of that kind, even if the committee were only to act in an advisory capacity. I am satisfied that no interest whatever will be taken in local authorities in the future unless the powers are given back to the county councils.

Reference has been made to the letting of houses. Again, I say that no one person, no matter what his capabilities are, is capable all the time of determining who is best entitled to a house. In the old days, members of county councils and corporations got more annoyance from the letting of houses than from anything else. Nevertheless, they were prepared to put up with it. They tried to do their best, and to give the houses to the most deserving people. There is dissatisfaction at the present moment because of the method of letting houses.

Up to the time of the County Management Act, the borough surveyor was always present at meetings of the corporation to which I belong. Since the passing of the Act, he has not been present at one meeting. I suggest that that is a very serious matter, and that no work can be done properly unless the officials concerned attend the meetings of their various councils. If a complaint is raised about something connected with the borough surveyor's work, the town clerk will take a note of it; he will submit it to the county manager; he in turn will have a "confab" with the borough surveyor, who will give him a kind of an answer, and the matter will come back again to the council. Weeks and weeks are lost before anything is done, whereas, if the borough surveyor had attended the meeting, heard the views of the council and got the work done immediately, time and perhaps a good deal of money would be saved, because when necessary repairs are delayed deterioration is bound to result.

I suggest to the Minister that the whole system of local government ought to be examined. There is not a bit of use in talking about allowing a further period in which to see how the County Management Act works. It is apparent to everybody now that it is not working properly; that it is not working in the interests of democracy; that it is not working in the interests of the people who elected the councils to do their work. I am perfectly satisfied that nobody will offer themselves as candidates in the next election.

Minister for Local Government and Public Health (Mr. MacEntee)

Will the Deputy offer himself?

Mr. Corish

I will. I definitely will.

Mr. MacEntee

Well, the Deputy is somebody.

Mr. Corish

Well, I will fight as long as I can. Of course, there are people who say that the County Management Act is all right, but I think it will be found that they are people of this type: they are either people who tried to be councillors, time and time again, and who have been rejected by the public; or they are people who have been in county councils and corporations and got "fired"; or they are people who have certain axes to grind, and do not want to see the plain people govern in this country.

Question put.

The Dáil divided:—Tá, 16; Níl, 70.

Tá

Blowick, Joseph.
Cafferky, Dominick.
Cogan, Patrick.
Corish, Richard.
Davin, William.
Donnellan, Michael.
Everett, James.
Flanagan, Oliver J.
Halliden, Patrick J.
Keyes, Michael.
Norton, William.
O'Donnell, William F.
O'Leary, John.
O'Sullivan, Martin.
Sheldon, William A.W.
Spring, Daniel.

Níl

Aiken, Frank.
Allen, Denis.
Bartley, Gerald.
Boland, Patrick.
Brady, Brian.
Brady, Seán.
Breen, Daniel.
Brennan, Thomas.
Breslin, Cormac.
Briscoe, Robert.
Burke, Patrick (Co. Dublin).
Butler, Bernard.
Carter, Thomas.
Childers, Erskine H.
Colbert, Michael.
Colley, Harry.
Corry, Martin J.
Cosgrave, Liam.
Crowley, Fred H.
Daly, Francis J.
Derrig, Thomas.
de Valera, Eamon.
Flynn, Stephen.
Fogarty, Andrew.
Friel, John.
Furlong, Walter.
Giles, Patrick.
Gorry, Patrick J.
Hilliard, Michael.
Humphreys, Francis.
Keating, John.
Kennedy, Michael J.
Killilea, Mark.
Kilroy, James.
Kissane, Eamon.
Beegan, Patrick.
Blaney, Neal.
Boland, Gerald.
Lemass, Seán F.
Little, Patrick J.
Loughman, Frank.
Lydon, Michael F.
Lynch, Finian.
Lynch, James B.
McCann, John.
McCarthy, Seán.
McEllistrim, Thomas.
MacEntee, Seán.
McGilligan, Patrick.
Moran, Michael.
Morrissey, Michael.
Mulcahy, Richard.
O Briain, Donnchadh.
O Ceallaigh, Seán T.
O'Connor, John S.
O'Grady, Seán.
O'Higgins, Thomas F.
O'Loghlen, Peter J.
O'Reilly, Matthew.
O'Rourke, Daniel.
Rice, Bridget M.
Ryan, James.
Ryan, Mary B.
Ryan, Robert.
Sheridan, Michael.
Skinner, Leo B.
Traynor, Oscar.
Walsh, Laurence.
Walsh, Richard.
Ward, Conn.

Tellers:—Tá: Deputies Keyes and Corish; Níl: Deputies Kissane and Kennedy.

Motion declared lost.

Dáil Éireann debate - Thursday, 21 Sep 1944