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THE GOVERNMENT ARE delaying Fianna Fáil’s bill for a directly-elected mayor for Dublin until next year.
This is due to there being a commitment in the programme for a partnership government to consider directly elected mayors in cities as part of wider potential local government reform measures.
A counter motion to the Green Party’s bill on the same issue is also being tabled.
It’s understood the government is not opposed to the idea of a directly-elected mayor in principle – but believes that there needs to be wider consultation and discussion on the issue.
Therefore, Minister Simon Coveney sought approval from Cabinet today to decline the second reading of the Fianna Fáil bill until 30 June 2017.
Earlier today, Fianna Fáil’s Dublin South West TD and spokesperson for Dublin, John Lahart said he was confident his bill would be passed by the Oireachtas this week.
Under the party’s proposal, every citizen in Dublin city and county would get to vote in a plebiscite in May 2018, with first mayoral elections held in May 2019.
Speaking ahead of the debate tonight, he said Dublin currently has four local authorities, four chief executives, four mayors, 183 councillors, and countless state agencies in Dublin, and often they competing against each other rather than together.
Lahart used losing the Web Summit to Lisbon as one such reason as to why Dublin should have a directly-elected mayor.
“I think one of the most dispiriting interviews about Dublin in the last number of years was that with Paddy Cosgrave on Marian [Finuncane] on Saturday when he said Dublin didn’t have the capacity to hold an event with 53,000 delegates and we lost the web summit.”
“A directly elected mayor would provide singular leadership to this structure,” said Lahart, adding that the position would move beyond “ceremonial purpose”.
Dublin spokesperson
Admitting that he is a “jackeen” – as Dublin spokesperson – he said bringing in a directly-elected mayor for other cities like Cork or Limerick, would “confuse matters”.
The government’s standpoint is that other cities may well be considered in the wider context of local government reform contained in the programme for government.
The Green Party, who also has a bill for a directly elected mayor for the capital, said it would like to see a directly-elected mayor rolled out for cities around Ireland.
If and when introduced, how would the new office be paid for?
“I would see it as cost neutral, in that it would be met by the existing resources of the four local authorities,” said Lahart.
Speaking about the Green Party bill, Eamon Ryan said the funding for the new office would be be found within existing resources.
“We know we can do this without putting an additional burden on the tax payer,” he said.
Ryan said it is a move away from “unelected managers who aren’t answerable to anyone”.
He said it is “without a doubt a reduction of power of county managers, making them answerable to a directly elected mayor”.
When asked if county manager’s salaries would be impacted due to much of their responsibilities being transferred to the mayor, the Green Party leader said:
“It is not a cost issue it is a democratic issue.”
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Washington, D.C. (District of Columbia) is not in any state
It is, it’s in an awful state.
Question 1 is completely incorrect. Gave up there.
Agree – it’s not in any state as they didn’t want any one state having control over the federal government.
They want it to be a state now govern like the other states but those on the Hill do not want that.
Gave up after Question 1. Washington DC is not in a State. It’s built on donated land from Maryland & Virginia which created District of Columbia. Unless my schooling was completely wrong
I thought Washington DC wasn’t part of any state? Didn’t Maryland just donate land to the district? I could be wrong…
Maryland and Virginia. The far side of the Potomac was later ceded back to Virginia.
In fairness “how many times can Ireland fit into Russia?” Is a stupid question. It’s guessing at best.
In fairness druid, if you knew all 54 African countries and their flags you’ve been wasting your life. Be happy with your one!
I said Ireland for the highest population question. I was right to say Ireland too because Ireland is the right answer. If you meant Republic of Ireland you should have said ‘Republic of Ireland’.
“The name of the State is Éire, or, in the English language, Ireland.” – Article 4
Must try harder. Two incorrect questions although i went for ireland as its not a country. Pretty easy for a supposed hard quiz
It says ‘countries’ not ‘islands’, Ireland is the official name for the this country as per the Constitution.
“Republic of Ireland” is a football team. The official name of the country is written on the cover of your passport (as is the norm) and in two languages no less.
You would be right if you said ‘Ireland’(although not for your reasoning). As per the Good Friday Agreement the population of Ireland can include anybody living in Northern Ireland that takes Irish citizenship.
District of Columbia isn’t a state. The city of Washington has no senator, its why they have “taxation without representation” on their car licence plates. Poor form to get such an easy question wrong in a quiz you created.
They have no congressman
They have Congressmen/women, but no Senators.
The have one honorary congressperson, who has no voting rights in Congress, yet the cities budget is decided upon by the House.
/Useless knowledge acquired from too much time watching West Wing
I’m in the middle of watching it again! It just never gets old…
Question one is tricky cos its wrong!
Answer to Q5 is also wrong. It is the Gall-Peters Projection, commonly known as the Peters projection.
Sorry for being pedantic
Any hardcore West Wing fan knows it well
Brilliant episode!
Poor CJ couldn’t cope..
There are 50 states in the USA, DC is not in any of them. DC does not a Senator or a Congressman, it is governed by the House of Representatives, and has a Mayor. I
Washington DC is a federal district under the exclusive jurisdiction of the Congress and the District is therefore not a part of any U.S. state.
Ireland has 6.4 million people. Norway is next with just over 5 million.
It was 4,588,252 at the last census, unlikely to have grown by 2 million since then.
It’s careless to overlook nearly 2 million people.
Well I’m shite at geography…..
So is the author, judging by the first question
HO HO HO! ;D
Questions 1 & 5 are incorrect. It’s called the Peters projection (or galls Peter to be very accurate). And while it does show the correct area of the countries of the world, it doesn’t show the correct shape.
Nearest city to Dublin is Liverpool. Now, if the question was which of THESE cities is closest …
Washington DC, I thought that meant de capital,!!!
I got the Los Angeles one only. That, only because the world map was on view :-(
This should be called the hardest ever primary school geography quiz. Geography is a lot more than knowing capital cities and population numbers!
10/10 on fourth try ;)
7/10. Some hard questions there
Load of shite
started well…..
8/10…smugness
You scored 4 out of 10!
What are ewe doing!?
You lost?
DC is a clue to the first one, District of Columbia?
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