It will be seen from the Long Title of the Bill, and from the first paragraph of the explanatory memorandum which has been circulated to Senators, that this Bill arises in consequence of the enactment of the Local Government (No. 2) Act, 1960. Part II of that Act rationalised local borrowing powers by giving local authorities a general power to borrow or lend for the purpose of any of their functions or duties, and provided for the control of such borrowing and lending. Section 9 of the Act precluded borrowing or lending by local authorities save pursuant to Part II of the Act. When section 9 was under discussion during the passage of the Bill through the Dáil, I intimated that I was considering the introduction of a Local Government (Repeal of Enactments) Bill to repeal the earlier enactments empowering and regulating borrowing by local authorities.
Prior to 1960, the practice was that every statute enabling or requiring local authorities to perform a function or carry out works included provisions to authorise borrowing specifically for the purpose of performing that function or carrying out such works. The statute usually regulated the manner of borrowing and in some cases the repayment of loans and related matters. All of these matters are now governed by the 1960 Act and the primary purpose of the present Bill is, therefore, to remove from the statute book the provisions which were rendered ineffective by the 1960 Act.
The provisions replaced by Part II of the Act of 1960 are contained in a multitude of enactments, reaching back in time for more than a century. It will be appreciated that the borrowing powers were associated in a good number of cases with enactments which are now in themselves ineffective or obsolete, having been superseded by modern legislation, or having otherwise become unnecessary through lapse of time. Some of these enactments have been included in the schedule of repeals, where specific repeal seemed desirable and could be effected without widening unduly the scope of the Bill.
The effect of the Bill, as I have stated, will be to remove from the statute book provisions which are, in fact, already spent or obsolete. There is one divergence from this principle which I would like to mention. It relates to grants by a local authority to a vocational education committee under the Vocational Education Act, 1930. That Act required the consent of the Minister for Local Government to the making of the grant, and gave power to borrow for the purpose of making a grant. The function of sanctioning the borrowing has already been transferred to the Minister for Education by the Local Government (No. 2) Act, 1960, and the proposed repeal of the relevant clauses in subsections (1) and (2) of section 51 of the 1930 Act will transfer to that Minister also the function of consent to a grant. I would emphasise that, apart from this one exception, which is a logical sequel to the 1960 Act, the proposed repeals will remove from the statute book provisions which for one reason or another are no longer operative, and will effect no change whatever in current local government controls or practice.
