LOCAL GOVERNMENT

IN

The Republic of

IRELAND

General Information

The Republic of Ireland is a unitary state with a written constitution. And it is one of the most centralized states in Europe having few responsibilities.

The present structure of local government in the Republic of Ireland is largely a legacy of nineteenth century British administration.

• The Irish Constitution recognizes the role of local government in providing democratic representation of local communities.

• LG gained this status by the Twentieth Amendment of the Constitution Act 2001 Article 28A, which was approved by referendum on 11 June 1999 and signed in as a law. LG in the past hadnt been codified in the constitution, its status was held by acts of government .

• This recognition endorses the democratic representative role of local government and guarantees local elections in Ireland at least every five years.

Size and Levels

• The Local Government Act, 2001 simplified the local government system, creating a two-tier system in which the principal tier of local government are county and city councils,which cover the entire territory of the state and have general responsibility for all functions of local government except in 80 towns within the territory of county councils, where the lower tier of town councils exist with certain more limited functions.

The first tier:At county/city level: 29 County Councils, 5 City Councils.

There is at least one Council for each county.For example: Dublin county has 3 Councils . Tipperary county has 2 councils; North and South Tipperary.

The county council has jurisdiction or control throughout its administrative area. Within the county council administrative area there may be a borough or town council area (second tier).

Second tier: within these councils and forming part of

them are other local authorities known as towns (5 Borough Councils and 75 Town Councils. Each of the 80 towns elects its own local authority known as a town council or, in five cases, a borough council).

• The Acts do not differentiate between Borough Councils and Town Councils in terms of their powers; only in terms of the number of elected councillors do the entities differ.

The Regional LevelRegional level 1Eight Regional AuthoritiesBorder Regional AuthorityDublin Regional Authority Mid Eastern Regional Authority Midland Regional Authority Mid West Regional Authority South East Regional Authority

South West Regional AuthorityWest Regional Authority

This level co-ordinate some of the county/city and sub-county activities; they play a monitoring role in relation to the use of EU structural funds.

Regional level 2• Two regional authorities, known as Regional

assemblies were established in July 1999 under new structures for regionalization.

• They promote co-ordination of the provision of public services in their areas, manage new regional operational programmes in the next Community Support Framework and monitoring the general impact of all EU programmes of assistance

The Elements of Local Authorities

The Manager

• Within the city/county council, each has a county manager. The county manager is the manager for each of the elected local authorities in the county.

• He is chief executive who is employed to manage their local authority. Some counties in Ireland share a County Manager.

• The County or City Manager performs the executive functions of the County or City Council. He or she supervises, co-ordinates, manages and pays the employees and officers of the Council.

• He or she also makes contracts on behalf of the Council.

• County or City Managers in Ireland are recruited through a competitive recruitment process organized by the Public Appointments Service.

• Once appointed, the County or City Manager will remain

in office for a term of 7 years (although this can also be extended by an additional three years). The retirement age for County or City Managers is 65.

• If a Council wishes to suspend or remove a County or City Manager, a resolution must be passed by the Council. At least two-thirds of the Councillors must vote for the resolution after 7 days notice. The Minister then sanctions the removal of the County or City Manager.

The Council

The elected council is the policy-making arm of the local authority, who act by what are termed

‘reserved functions .’

Reserved functions are defined by law and specified across a whole range of enactments. These comprise mainly decisions on important matters of policy and finance (e.g. adoption of

annual budget, development plan, bye-laws) .

• The members of each local authority in Ireland are all called 'Councillors'. The number of members of each local authority is fixed by law (Schedule 7 of the Local Government Act, 2001).

• Councillors are directly elected in local elections by members of the local community. The number of Councillors elected to each local authority depends on the population of the local authority area.

The MAYOR

• Every year, local authorities throughout Ireland elect a Chairman for a term of one year and a Vice-Chairman. He chairs the meetings of the local authorities.

• On an occasion where this is an equal division of votes on an issue, they may exercise a second or casting vote (except however, in the case of when a new Mayor is being elected).

• The Mayor is responsible for the conduct of business and maintenance of order at meetings and can call for (or requisition) a special meeting of the council and obtain information from the County Manager on relevant matters

• The office of the Mayor also has a representational role on behalf of the local authority. This means that the Mayor represents the local authority at civic, public and ceremonial events in Ireland.

The Region

• There are eight regional authorities and two regional assemblies, whose members are not elected by a separate regional election but nominated by the county and city councils within their area.

Functions

These are typically broken down into eight broad categories:

• Housing• Planning• Roads• Water supply and sewerage• Development incentives and controls• Environmental protection including rivers, lakes, air and noise• Recreation facilities and amenities• Agriculture, education, health• In addition to the functions outlined above, a fundamental role of

democratically elected local government is the representation of local communities, voicing local concerns and responding to local needs.

Powers of local authorities

There are a number of ways in which local authorities in Ireland carry out their functions. Some functions are carried out by the members

of the authority acting as a body at meetings .

Some functions are carried out by committees (for example, the Vocational Educational Committee) and some functions are carried out through the County or City Manager.

RulesAt council meetings, the council may pass resolutions, for example to introduce or change charges and rates.

The council can also pass Bye-Laws when it is in the interests of the common good of the community that an activity should be regulated or controlled. It also has the power to make Bye-Laws to prevent or stop any defaults in the area.

Local authorities frequently make Bye-Laws in relation to the control of parking, litter and animal control.

Two months before making a Bye-Law, the local authority must publish a notice in a newspaper circulating in the area to which the Bye-Law relates, indicating that it proposes to make the Bye-Law. The public is entitled to inspect the proposed Bye-Law and make submissions about it before it comes into effect.

Revenue Assignment

• The reform of local government finance has been a constant policy issue since the 1960s.

• There have been at least 16 reviews of local government since the 1962 Economic Research Institute report entitled Local Government Finance in Ireland.

LG share in GDP

• Local government revenue is relatively low in Ireland.

• In 2008, it accounted for approximately 7.7% of GDP.

• Ireland’s local Government revenue at 7.7% of GDP is one of the lowest rates across the Eurostat countries.

Income Streams

Source: Local Authority Budgets 2009 (Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, 2009) .

Source: Local Authority Budgets 2009 (Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, 2009) .

• Therefore, the biggest source of local government funding is national government followed by revenue from goods and services.

• However that masks the fact the just over half (51%) of the income of county councils comes from central government.

• City and town councils have more scope to raise revenue from commercial rates and charges than county councils which are more reliant on central government funding .

• The extent to which local authorities are self financing varies across Ireland

Expenditure assignment

Local government can spend in areas where it has no control of policy, e.g. Irish local government expenditure

on education .

Education 15.3%Social protection 3.5%Services 10.8%Health 0.0%Economic Affairs 28.0%Other 42.3%

Source: CEMR- Dexia (2009)

Capital Expenditure

Capital expenditure is expenditure that results in the creation of an asset beyond the year in which that asset is provided eg houses, swimming pool, library etc. It is financed largely by State grants with the balance being funded from development levies and borrowings and own internal resources and property sales. In the case of some projects they may be funded entirely by local authority own resources and borrowing.

Current Expenditure

A local authority’s annual budget represents current expenditure which covers the day-to-day running of the local authority (including staff salaries, housing maintenance, pensions, operational costs of treatment plants etc.). The annual budget is adopted by the elected council at its budget meeting.

Capacity Building• The government has engaged a series of reforms to improve the

managerial capacities of local authorities administration and their capacity to deliver high quality public services.

• In 1996, the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government initiated Better Local Government, a blueprint for reform of the local authorities structure.

• In 2000, the Planning Act and the 2001 Local Government Act made changes to local authority procedures to ensure more transparency

• In 2004, the Local Government Management Services Board published its first report, which detailed the performance of local authorities in the delivery of public services through as set of indicators.

• The reports, which have been produced on an annual basis, have increased the accountability required from local authorities.

Local Democracy

Local elections are held in Ireland every 5 years in the month of May or June. At these elections, members of the local community elect Councillors to represent the community in local authorities. At present, there are over 3 million local government electors in Ireland.

The responsibility for conducting the election lies with the secretary or clerk of each local authority . Each local authority pays the cost of running the election.

On the polling day, voters may vote by secret ballot in their local polling station. The electoral system is based on proportional representation.

Rules

You do not have to be an Irish citizen to vote in a local election.

You must be over 18 years of age and you must live in the local electoral area.

You must be registered on the Register of Electors compiled every year by County

and City Councils .

Central Supervision

Local authorities in Ireland are responsible for the delivery of public services under central supervision, and they have significant responsibilities in the delivery of permits and in planning. Most of their regulatory work rests on regulations that have been defined at the centre of government.

The Department of the Environment, Heritage Local Government is responsible for the various legislative codes dealing with the registration of electors and the

conduct of elections and referendums .

One of the key roles of the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government is to set down national policy for the local government sector, and to provide the necessary legislative and regulatory framework within

which the sector operates .

The relationship between the Minister and local authorities, which is also governed by legislation, ranges from:

• Total prohibition on involvement by the minister in local authority matters (e.g. planning permissions).

• Optional involvement (e.g. issuing directions on development plans, holding public inquiries etc).

• Required involvement (e.g. determining local electoral boundaries, the ultimate decision on removing a manager from office, etc) .

• consultation across a wide range of areas.

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