Subsection (a) provides:
An election of members of every local authority shall be held in the year 1967 and quinquennially thereafter.
Has the Minister, I wonder, given any deep thought to this question of quinquennial elections in relation to members of local authorities? This has been in operation only since 1955 and one wonders if, in all the circumstances, this is the best procedure. I am speaking now from the point of view of elected members of local authorities and not just as one who has been elected on a number of occasions to a local authority. Prior to the provision for quinquennial elections, elections were held every three years. On two occasions, the elections did not take place at the end of the three-year period. In June, 1953, the life of the local authorities was extended to 1955 and in 1948, there was also an extension because of certain peculiar circumstances. It seems strange that members of local authorities should be elected for a five-year period when, even though the life span of the Dáil is supposed to be for five years, in actual fact, no Dáil has ever run its full course. In other countries local representatives are elected every two years. I doubt if Senators and Congressmen are elected for five years in the USA.
I raise the matter from the point of view of the continuous change taking place in the balance of population. The Minister may have power to make regulations between now and June, 1967, providing for a change in boundaries, but, as the position is, a candidate for election to Dublin Corporation, who is presently a member of the corporation, if successful at the next election will, as a result of contesting only two elections in a period of 12 years, have represented the people in that particular area for that 12 years.
Secondly, a candidate for any of the nine municipal areas will be elected to represent a very disproportionate number of the electorate in his particular area. This has occurred because of the change in the balance of population. May I cite the particular case of the No. I Municipal Area in which candidates elected in 1955 were elected from an approximate electorate of 30,000 but in 1960 the electorate in that area had gone up to over 40,000? Unless there is a change, candidates in the coming elections in that area may well have to go before an electorate of between 45,000 and 50,000. A councillor is not in receipt of any remuneration; he receives nothing for travelling expenses, the sole exception being members of Dublin Health Authority, to whom travelling expenses are paid, and a councillor is expected, with his colleagues, to look after the interests of a municipal area which is bigger than any Dáil constituency.
With the growth of tenants' associations, residents' associations, and so on, it appears that some redress is needed. Local authority representatives who should be immediately responsible in regard to local and other matters should be given the opportunity of reporting back to those they represent more frequently than once in five years. Possibly the reason why these quinquennial elections were decided upon was partly administrative convenience and partly the reluctance of this House, or of the Minister, from time to time to make provision for local authority candidates to have access to their electors by means of free postage.
If this election takes place next June, every candidate, whether he is standing for a corporation, a county council, or town commission, will, if he wishes to have any form of election literature conveyed to the electorate asking for their support, have to bear the cost of the postage, or else have the literature delivered from door to door within the area and this may prove expensive and onerous in cases where the area is large and scattered such as in the No. 1 Municipal Area, or in the No. 5 or No. 7 Municipal Areas. Such larger areas could impose a handicap on the candidates to the extent that they would not be in a position, having served the people as councillors fairly well over a period, to contact the electorate in order to place their records before them. Consequently, they are at a very serious disadvantage in contesting the elections. This is aside from the overall cost.
It may well be that the Minister will say that there would be added cost if elections were held more frequently, but on the other hand, more frequent elections would encourage the Minister and the Government to look at this whole question of the problems facing local government candidates not only in regard to their contesting elections but in regard to endeavouring to carry out their duties. The Minister, more than anybody else in this House, is in a better position to realise, because of legislation this year, last year and in the previous year, the burdens which fall on the shoulders of local authority representatives who are serving the community, and that these burdens are growing every year.