This Bill provides for the abolition of Dublin County Council, Dún Laoghaire Borough Corporation and Dean's Grange Joint Burial Board and their replacement by three new county councils — Fingal, South Dublin and Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown. The three new county councils will be the first to be established since the existing county councils were established by legislation enacted in 1898.
In recent years legislation affecting local government in Dublin has come before the Oireachtas on a number of occasions. The Local Government (Reorganisation) Act, 1985, divided the county of Dublin into electoral counties for the purpose of the local elections of that year. These areas are essentially the same as those for which the new county councils are now being established by this Bill.
The Local Government Act, 1991, continued the process by requiring Dublin County Council to establish an area committee for each electoral county and to delegate functions to them. Since then, preparations for the transition to three counties have been going ahead and the Bill gives statutory effect to these, covering matters such as assignment of staff to the new authorities, division of assets, liabilities, service arrangements, etc. It also includes various consequential provisions arising from the abolition of Dublin County Council, Dún Laoghaire Corporation and the Dean's Grange Joint Burial Board, for example, the continuance of legal proceedings, by-laws, etc. In addition, there are other special provisions to promote necessary co-ordination between Dublin Corporation and the three new county councils. Under the Bill, the members of the area committees will become the first members of the new county councils. The area managers appointed for those committees will become the first county managers for the new councils.
This Bill contains many technical provisions. It has 39 sections and is divided into five parts. Furthermore, there are three Schedules to the Bill with an additional 40 articles and a lengthy list of repeals. Short explanations of these are given in the explanatory memorandum. In summary, much of the detailed content of the Bill derives from two principal factors, the dissolution of the existing local authorities and their replacement by three new ones and the impact of the new arrangements on various other nonlocal government codes of law. The aim is to establish the new county councils so that they can commence operation on 1 January.
Prior to consideration of the Committee Stage of the Bill, it should be noted that, in addition to the Minister for the Environment, amendments have been tabled by Deputies Currie, Doyle, Gilmore, Keogh and Sargent. The text of the amendments can be found in the list of amendments which was circulated this morning. We will now commence Committee Stage. As Members are probably aware, an order of the House was made today that we report back to the Dáil not later than Thursday morning. We will, therefore, have to conclude Committee Stage by tomorrow evening.
