Vol. 346 No. 3
asked the Minister for the Environment if he will state in respect of county councils the number of (a) servants and (b) officers who have been laid-off or put on short-time in 1983; the dates; and, if no lay-off or short-time statistics have been sought, if he will arrange to ascertain and state the extent of these developments.
297.
asked the Minister for the Environment if he is aware that shortly after dismissing nearly 40 direct labour employees on the grounds of redundancy or shortage of funds, in the media (details supplied) Dublin County Council have advertised for tenders for sub-contracting work, works on footpaths, channels, kerbing, walling, fencing and seeding of verges, and that the local authority appear to have adopted a policy of prolonging the unemployment of employees who were recently let go when employment could be offered to them after a short time; and if it is his intention in allocating funds to discourage this policy of dis-employment during an employment crisis.
303.
asked the Minister for the Environment if he will give details of any short-time working arrangements operated by local authorities.
I propose to take Questions Nos. 296, 297 and 303 together.
Decisions as to the continued employment of non-officer grades by local authorities are entirely a matter for the local authorities concerned and one in which I have no function. While local authorities are not obliged to inform me as to the numbers of employees laid off or put on short-time working, as far as I am aware the situation in this regard is as follows:
Cavan County Council — 290 workers put on a three-day week from 3 October. 193 of these were brought back to fulltime working from 7 November. The balance of 97 workers will remain on a three-day week until the end of December.
Galway County Council — Between 9 September and 18 November, a total of 266 workers were on short time for between three and five weeks. Since 18 November all staff have been on a full working week.
Dublin County Councul — 77 workers were laid off at end September. The county council states that these were workers taken on for a limited period only.
With regard to the question of Dublin County Council carrying out development work by contract, the matter is one for the county council. However, my understanding is that this work is done partly by direct labour and partly by contract. Expansion of the direct labour operations would, I am informed, involve substantial investment in equipment and the employment of additional staff and raise a question of the economics of such a venture having regard to the volume and uneven flow of such work coming on stream.
I would point out that this Government are keenly aware of local authorities' financial position and, since taking office, has taken major steps to deal with the matter.
An extra £31.5 million was provided through the rates support grants in addition to the amounts published in the public service estimates in November last. Also for the first time since 1978 local authorities were free to strike whatever rate they wished. Thirdly, the enactment of the Local Government (Financial Provisions) No. 2 Act, 1983 greatly extended the powers of local authorities to supplement their resources giving them wider scope to charge for services.
