Government ‘look down’ on local authorities, claims Tipperary councillor in stinging attack
The Government shows “derision” to local authorities, a Tipperary councillor has claimed at the latest meeting of the Nenagh Municipal District.
At the November meeting, following a debate about roads funding, independent councillor Michael O’Meara said that it seems like national Government “looks down on” local authorities, and doesn’t take them seriously.
"There seems to be a void there between national Government and local authorities in general,” Cllr O’Meara said.
"They’re just not listening to local authorities, I don’t know why it is, even when I hear ministers in the Dáil and you can hear the condescending tone in their voice when they have to address anything to do with local authorities,” he added.
"They really do look down on us, the national Government.”
This adds to the work of the council, Cllr O’Meara added, saying that not feeling supported by the Government makes the work of the council executive and councillors themselves harder.
"When you look at the Oireachtas reports, or you look at the Dáil committees, the derision that they have for local authorities is absolutely unbelievable,” Cllr O’Meara said.
“There’s a job of work for us to do collectively, as local authorities, whether we do that through our unions or the AILG (Association of Local Government) or whatever, but it seems to me that national Government have no time for local authorities,” Cllr O’Meara added.
Tipperary is getting left behind according to the independent councillor, who said if things aren’t happening in the major cities, then the Government don’t want to know about it.
"Unless it’s happening in Dublin, Cork, Galway or Limerick, and good luck to them. The amount of housing that’s being built in Limerick is massive, and it’s absolutely brilliant, it’s great to see it.
"Cork always maintained they were a country on their own, and they really are, the amount of wealth in Cork as well is unbelievable, but it’s not percolating down to us, we seem to be going, cap in hand every year,” he said.
Cllr O’Meara said that any money that is allocated to local authorities now doesn’t go as far because of inflation, and that funding overall has been cut.
"The money doesn’t go as far, our national budget for roads from Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) dropped from €700million three years ago, it’s down to €300million now, it’s just not good enough.”
"But they really have derision for us as local authority members at the moment,” Cllr O’Meara concluded.