Over 1,100 candidates back stronger local democracy

More than 1,100 local election candidates have backed union campaign for stronger local democracy

Ten national political parties, who between them are fielding over 1,000 (1,036) local election candidates in Friday’s council elections, have signed up to a trade union pledge to increase local authority funding and restore local council powers in areas like housing, water and environmental protection.

The figure rises to over 1,100 (1,103) when independents, and individual signatories whose national party didn’t back the pledge, are included.

Find out which candidates backed our pledge HERE.

The ‘Local Power Pledge’ has been endorsed at national level by Fianna Fáil, Sinn Féin, the Labour Party, the Social Democrats, the Green Party, People Before Profit, Solidarity, Independents 4 Change, Aontú and the Workers Party. Almost 300 (294) candidates also signed the pledge individually, including 15 Fine Gael candidates and 52 Independents.

The pledge is part of the ‘More Power To You’ campaign for enhanced local democracy and community services, which was launched by Fórsa, Siptu and Connect in March. Between them, the three unions represent over 30,000 local council workers.

The unions called for substantially increased revenue and funding powers for local authorities after they published research that shows Irish councils have less autonomy from central government than their counterparts in 39 European countries. Their ‘More Power To You’ campaign also calls for legislative changes to facilitate directly-elected mayors and restore and expand town councils, which were abolished in 2014.

Fórsa Director of Campaigns Joe O’Connor, who has coordinated the campaign, said: “The three sponsoring trade unions have asked their members to check which local candidates have signed the pledge before casting their vote on Friday. The overwhelming response to our campaign demonstrates a hunger for stronger local democracy among citizens and their elected representatives. The fact that only 8% of Irish public spending occurs at local government level, compared to a EU23 average of over 23%, is compounding shortcomings in services as diverse as housing, water and waste, and sustainable domestic energy use,” he said.

Prior to launching the campaign in March, the unions commissioned research from Dr Mary Murphy of Maynooth University. It found that Irish local authorities perform fewer functions than municipalities across Europe, with their roles largely confined to physical infrastructure and environmental and recreational services. Her report, Democracy Works If You Let It, said this impacts negatively on local employment, service quality, value-for-money, environmental protection, and local jobs and economic development. It has also contributed to declining local election voter turnout.

Dr Murphy said Irish local democracy had been eroded by austerity-era budget cuts and staff reductions; the centralisation of services like water, driving licences and higher education grants; the privatisation of services like refuse collection and housing; and excessive executive direction and new management processes that have increased bureaucratic powers at the expense of political representatives.

The ‘More Power To You’ campaign sought commitments from political parties and candidates on a range of local government reforms covering waste, water, housing, and energy services. These include:

• Legislative changes to facilitate directly-elected mayors;
• The return and expansion of the town council system, which was abolished in 2014;
• Increased revenue and funding powers, with parallel systems of accountability and transparency, to move the percentage of local authority-managed public spending towards the European average;
• An immediate end to the outsourcing of council housing maintenance and a medium-term shift to a new local authority-led public housing model;
• Stronger regulation of the waste sector to ensure that every household has access to an affordable waste disposal service, as a precursor to the reintroduction of improved public provision;
• A constitutional referendum on the right to water, which should ensure that water and waste water services remain in public ownership and control;
• Investment in local authority environmental and sustainable energy infrastructure and staff, to facilitate the maximum use of the SEAI ‘Better Energy’ programme.

Three of the national parties that signed the pledge did so with slight caveats. Fianna Fáil does not support the reintroduction of public provision of domestic waste services. The Workers’ Party and Solidarity do not support directly-elected mayors.

Adrian Kane, SIPTU Divisional Organiser, said: “Ireland needs real local government now. Politicians must follow through on the pledges they have made. We need to transform local democracy, and we need it to work for local communities.”

Derek Kelleher, public sector official with Connect said: ‘The ‘More Power to You’ campaign aims to regain control of our local services that the community uses on a daily basis, and empower our democratically elected representatives to make real change for real people. As the largest craft union in Ireland, Connect believes that we have the members with the knowledge and skills to take ownership of these vital services, which will provide quality and quantity faster than any private sector.”

Fórsa National Secretary Peter Nolan said: “Irish people take great pride in their counties and cities, yet this element of our democracy has been systematically eroded by centralisation, privatisation and austerity. We are urging our members and supporters to consider backing local election candidates who have signed up to rebuild local service and local accountability.”

Breakdown of candidates/parties signed up to the ‘Local Power Pledge’
There are 1,104 candidates in total:

• All 414 Fianna Fáil candidates*, the party position is in support of 9 out of the 10 pledge demands, with the exception of local authorities being enabled to re-enter domestic waste collection services. 43 Fianna Fáil candidates, as per the individual returns, support the pledge in full;
• All 230 Sinn Féin candidates, the party position is to support the Local Power Pledge in full;
• All 111 Labour candidates, the party position is to support the Local Power Pledge in full;
• All 82 Green Party candidates, the party position is to support the Local Power Pledge in full;
• All 58 Social Democrats candidates, the party position is to support the Local Power Pledge in full;
• All 53 Aontú candidates, the party position is to support the Local Power Pledge in full;
• All 49 People Before Profit candidates, the party position is to support the Local Power Pledge in full;
• All 19 Solidarity candidates*, the party position is in support of 9 out of the 10 pledge demands, with the exception of directly elected mayors;
• All 13 Independents 4 Change candidates, the party position is to support the Local Power Pledge in full;
• All seven Workers Party candidates*, the party position is in support of 9 out of the 10 pledge demands, with the exception of directly elected mayors;
• 15 Fine Gael candidates – see spreadsheet of individual candidate pledge signatories;
• 53 Independent candidates – see spreadsheet of individual candidate pledge signatories.

The spreadsheet of candidates that have backed the pledge is available HERE.