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Column ‘Everything local authorities touch turns into a fiasco’

The performance of local councils ranges from incompetent to corrupt – and we need them out, writes William Campbell.

IN A RECENT column for TheJournal.ie, Aaron McKenna advocates devolving most of the powers of Irish government to what he calls our “castrated” county and town councils. He is wrong.

Irish local authorities (LAs) are bloated, incompetent, corrupt, sclerotic little fiefdoms who attempt to explain their interrupted record of failure by trotting out the lie that they ‘lack funds and powers’.

It is a lie. LAs spend in excess of €10billion a year, about 20 per cent of all government spending. McKenna doesn’t ask what they do with this vast amount of money, but I researched the topic for my book and was appalled at every fact I uncovered.

According to the Department of the Environment, LAs are responsible for:housing, planning, water supply and sewerage, recreation facilities, development incentives and controls, roads, environmental protection, agriculture, education and health.

LAs long ago lost responsibility for all except the first five items listed. Where they retain authority, their performance ranges from disastrous incompetence to catastrophic corruption.

They lost taxi regulation in 2004. For decades, they constricted the supply of taxi licences, creating havoc for consumers. Taxi-plate owners (rarely the drivers) employed Frank Dunlop to ‘lobby’ councillors. Taxi licences fetched up to €100,000 on the black market, attracting criminals eager to launder money, and commuters shivered in the rain.

There are 90 local authorities in Ireland with planning functions – responsible for creating zoning plans and giving planning permission. The banks, the developers, and the politicians who bailed them out are all getting their share of blame for the bust, but the LAs are getting off far too easily.

It was LAs who made many millionaires by converting farmland into estate after shoddily-built estate, far from employment, inaccessible on public transport, without a thought for schools or amenities for the residents, while vast tracts of inner-city brownfield sites decayed. LAs allowed the slapping up of concrete jungle ‘holiday developments’ that are ugly enough to guarantee tourists will never arrive.

Even where there is no money to be made in bribes, even when the task is mind-numbingly easy, and vital to our democracy – keeping an accurate list of voters – they can’t get it right. One entry in three on the electoral roll is wrong. Monkeys with typewriters could do better.

‘Politicians want to reward failure with even more power’

LAs report the cost of processing each student grant application – a basic bureaucratic function, implementing a rigid nationally-set formula. In Westmeath it costs €70.51, not cheap. In Tipperary North, it costs €484.25. Such vast variation indicates vast inefficiency.

Water and sewerage is one area where the LAs have genuine power, so many rural residents and tourists spend their summers vomiting cryptosporidium from their taps into their toilets. Everything local authorities touch turns into a fiasco: delays in driving tests, the disastrous implementation of penalty points, a country with fewer playgrounds than golf courses, the list goes on.

In the private sector, perform poorly and you will get your responsibilities and your budget cut. This minimises damage, and motivates performance. Politicians, unused to a world where merit is rewarded, reverse this idea. They want to reward failure with more power, and even more money.

I’m not surprised that politicians want more power and more money, but I am shocked that an otherwise clear-thinking Aaron McKenna has fallen for this. I am shocked because I expect that, like me, his private sector experience would tell him that increasing complexity in our society and economy is changing the way everything works.

Technology that allows companies to do things more efficiently also forces them to do less. McKenna’s company sells products from hundreds of companies, who source components and services from thousands more. If one company tired to take on the entire process of manufacturing even one piece of complex electronics, it would collapse under the workload.

Nobody expects each county in Ireland to have its own laptop factory, its own smartphone system or its own version of Facebook. Equally it is not reasonable to expect such tiny populations to contain the all the skills needed to manage complex tasks such as zoning , planning, or running a modern water and sewerage system.

The reason for the incompetence and inefficiency is that too-small organisations are taking on too many tasks. Corruption happens because the skill of management is also being spread too thinly; and when local officials often live in the same village as applicants, they can easily be bribed or put under to moral pressure to make the wrong call.

Ireland certainly needs radical reforms. One of the first should be to send the gelded old nags from our local councils to the knackers’ yard, not pretend that they are fit to run the Grand National.

William Campbell is the author of Here’s How: Creative Solutions for Ireland’s Economic and Social Problems.

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57 Comments
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    Mute Mary Nugent
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    May 31st 2023, 12:09 AM

    They should stay.

    189
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    Mute Peter
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    May 31st 2023, 6:55 AM

    @Mary Nugent:

    Surely you’re entitled to sell your own property

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    Mute Dramafree 2023
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    May 31st 2023, 8:33 AM

    @Mary Nugent: On what grounds should they stay? So because the owner previously rented accommodation to them, now that he wants to sell up, he should not be allowed do that? Who would be a landlord is all ill say.

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    Mute Cat Reid
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    May 31st 2023, 8:55 AM

    @Dramafree 2023: Who would want to see a group of people without a home based on one’s decision to sell.. Ruthless during a time like this.

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    Mute Lydia McLoughlin
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    May 31st 2023, 9:04 AM

    @Cat Reid: maybe they want to retire! They should be allowed to sell! I would NOT be a landlord under these conditions. Should rules change in regards to rental so everyone knows the rules, yes, but I do not believe I should not be able to sell my property and “get out” of my investment. And no I’m not a landlord btw.

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    Mute Dramafree 2023
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    May 31st 2023, 9:26 AM

    @Cat Reid: maybe he has no choice but to sell financially? It is not always an option to keep things. I myself had to sell in order to house my children.

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    Mute McMahon G
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    May 31st 2023, 10:05 AM

    @Cat Reid: So you don’t believe in private property rights?

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    Mute Gearóid MacEachaidh
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    May 31st 2023, 1:00 PM

    @Cat Reid: they have an offer from the council to buy at market value. This would keep the tenants from becoming homeless and get the building owner the same amount of money that he would get from the buyer he has lined up. He is refusing to engage with the council. There are laws in place to protect tenants in buildings with over 10 units. This landlord is trying to get around those legal protections.

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    Mute McMahon G
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    May 31st 2023, 6:39 AM

    Johansson the ‘poor’ radical marxist who wears a lovely Belstaff coat @ €1250.

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    Mute Joseph Mc Dermott
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    May 31st 2023, 6:59 AM

    @McMahon G: why , is she not entitled too. We’re you ever questioned as to how you dress. Would you prefer her to be in a track suit

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    Mute Cat Reid
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    May 31st 2023, 8:56 AM

    @McMahon G: should we care less? Maybe he had to invest in a warmer coat to keep himself warm in a poorly insulated apartment. Regardless of that its a pathetic observation and you are completely missing the point of the article.

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    Mute Peter
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    May 31st 2023, 6:57 AM

    If it causes undue financial hardship then let the RTB cover the additional costs until they find somewhere else to live.

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    Mute Turbofresh
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    May 31st 2023, 12:59 PM

    So heres the thing, I’m probably like a lot of people who met someone later in life. Both my partner and myself have houses. I’m pretty much moved in with her full time, but I’m not ready to sell nor do I plan on selling in the near future.

    I could rent my property, but why would I, what if things broke down and I needed my place back to live in, I’d have to rent for 2 years while I go through the RTB and courts to have my tenant removed… No thanks… much easier to just leave it idle and let it increase in value.

    People here really need to cop on with their approach to landlords. Most are decent people who have an extra property or vacant property through inheritance, meeting someone later in life or changes in personal circumstances.

    They are not evil money grabbing opportunists that the media are making out them to be

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    Mute Gearóid MacEachaidh
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    May 31st 2023, 1:05 PM

    @Turbofresh: your situation is different than this landlords. As a landlord with only one property you’re not obligated to follow the rules of the Tyrellstown agreement. You would have no issue if you wanted the property to move into or even to move family into. You would just have to give your tenants the required notice. This situation involved a building with over 30 units. There are different rules for corporate landlords.

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    Mute Turbofresh
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    May 31st 2023, 11:57 PM

    @Gearóid MacEachaidh: You obviously didnt see Paul Murphy grandstanding in the dail the night they lifted the evicition ban telling people to flout the law and overhold and explain how difficult and long a process it would be for the landlord to remove the tenant

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    Mute Darren Nulty
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    Jun 1st 2023, 12:28 PM

    The Landlord owns the property, gave loads of notice, can do as he pleases. They have no legal right to stay

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