Local Government (Support for Elected Members) Bill 2024: Second Stage Seanad Éireann — 2025-12-10 ============================================================ Fiona O'Loughlin (FF), Administrative Panel Like my colleagues, I welcome Councillor Malone and add my voice of gratitude to LAMA and AILG for all the work they do. I speak not only as someone who was elected by councillors but also as someone who served as a town commissioner, a town councillor and a county councillor. I absolutely value the work councillors do. In 1898, my grandfather was on the very first iteration of Kildare County Council. He died when my father was seven. Some 25 years later, my father was elected in one area. Subsequently, I was elected in a different area. I come from a family that values community service and local democracy. As previous speakers mentioned, the proudest moments of my life relate to being elected at those three levels of local government and as mayor of my county. I am Kildare to the core. I am proud of all the work that happens. I welcome this motion and the debate on it. It is not fair to say that the timed amendment is just kicking the can down the road. To be fair to the Government, there is a commitment in the programme for Government. One of the first things the Government put in place was the local democracy task force. In order for it to do its work - and the AILG and LAMA are engaging with it - there is a time-bound element relating to its report, which is due next summer. It is only fair to allow the democracy task force to deliver its report and make its recommendations on the basis of the good work that was done by the Seanad task force. However, I agree with colleagues who asked whether it will be possible to reduce the 12-month timeframe once the task force has delivered its recommendations. I ask for that to be considered. I agree about the issue of administrative expenses for councillors. Options should be given to local councillors. I could never work full time as a county councillor because I had to pay a mortgage on my own and needed to work outside my role as a councillor. However, many now choose to work full time, and it is wonderful that they do. While I would like to see opportunities for people to work full time in local government, at this time, if there were options, some who work other jobs while also serving as councillors would certainly opt for administrative support. It is only fair to say, however, that those who work full time as councillors would prefer to have financial resources themselves, and they would deserve them. Back in 2023, the Women's Parliamentary Caucus, of which I was chair, worked together with the Minister at the time to ensure that maternity leave was brought in for female councillors. We also worked with the Minister on ensuring that maternity leave would be brought in for Oireachtas Members. One of the regulations that came in at that time was that women on maternity leave would have the option if they did not take maternity leave to have extra admin support. If they went for co-option, they could co-opt someone to take their place within the council. To support an individual because every individual has their own different challenges, both professionally and personally, there should be a suite of measures that would suit and support that individual to help them carry out the excellent work they do. It is not just about infrastructure and setting the budget. There would be very few Christmas lights going up around the country without the councillors who are involved in that. There would be very few St. Patrick's Day parades and local arts festivals. Something that I spoke about this morning, and I will mention again is that we have heard councillors to the fore on the radio and television over the past weekend about the horrific situation in Edenderry where two awful deaths happened. To the fore in representing the community and the shock and trying to offer support were our local councillors in Edenderry. There is no end to what any local councillor, or indeed any representative is called to do. I raise the report from the Council of Europe's Congress of Local and Regional Authorities, CLRA. Again, our councillors do great work. The leader of the Irish delegation is Councillor Jimmy Maloney and the deputy leader is Councillor Gobnait Moynihan. A report was done in 2023, which monitored Ireland's compliance with the European Charter of Local Self-Government. That highlighted weaknesses in our local government system. It highlighted limited autonomy, weak financial independence and the need for stronger supports. I echo the call for the reinstatement of town councils. It was a sad day for democracy. They worked well even with small, limited budgets. I fully support reforms for our local authority members, but there needs to be a suite of measures and pensions need to put in place. I thank the Minister of State for being here and taking all of our messages back to the Government. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2025-12-10/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:26+00:00 Sitting date: 2025-12-10