The first review of local electoral areas for a decade will result in significant changes in the distribution of seats in councils on the east coast as well as in Cork and Galway.
Minister for the Environment John Gormley yesterday announced that he was establishing two separate committees to review the areas, with a view to implementing the revisions before the local elections in 2009.
The last review took place in 1998 and there have been major population increases and shifts since then. It is known that electoral wards under-represented include Lucan in Dublin which is 25 per cent at variance from the mean and the north and south inner cities in Dublin, which are both over 10 per cent at variance with the mean.
Both of the committees will be chaired by Niall Callan, the former secretary general of the Department of the Environment.
The first will examine borough councils in Dublin and other major population centres including Cork, Galway, Limerick and Waterford.
The other committee will review other local authorities, primarily county councils. The terms of reference require both to report back to Mr Gormley with their recommendations by June 20th next.
However, neither committee will have a mandate to increase or alter the number of councillors in any local authority areas. The existing overall boundaries of all city and county councils will also stay intact.
Instead, the committees will be empowered to review the distribution of seats within local authorities and to recommend the transfer of seats from one ward or electoral area to another, where there have been population shifts. It will also have power to make recommendations for revising the geographical boundaries of wards and electoral areas within a local authority area.
According to the Department of the Environment, increasing the number of councillors in a local authority, or changing the boundaries of borough and city councils, would have involved separate and lengthy processes that might not be completed in time for next year's local elections. Some of these questions may be considered in the context of a Green Paper on local government reform which will be published next month.
Another significant reform is the Government commitment to have a directly-elected mayor in Dublin. It has the strong backing of the Green Party, but Dublin city manager John Tierney has in the past few days suggested it may dilute the power of councillors.
