Cork councils review chairman defends merger plan

The chairman of a local-government review group has defended the group’s recommendation that Cork city and county councils should be merged after a number of planning experts criticised the proposal as being detrimental for Cork.

Alf Smiddy, who chaired the review group which came up with a majority report recommending a single unitary authority, said the recommendation was made only after careful consideration of evidence both nationally and internationally.

The three lecturers at the Centre for Planning Education and Research at University College Cork (UCC) – Brendan O’Sullivan, Jonathan Hall and William Brady – said a merger would fail to address the divergent needs of city and rural communities.

A single local authority “gives us the worst of both worlds – an oversized and unworkable entity that will never be able to fully meet the needs of the two constituencies. Instead they will be diluted, downgraded and confused. One or both will suffer,” they said.

Mr Smiddy rejected this and said that while his group had attended presentations by the UCC planners and had met them, they had very carefully analysed and dissected every aspects of the UCC submissions and had found them wanting.

International research

“Whilst I would be respectful of their perspectives, the reality is that their analysis fell short on the back of the weight of international research and practical examples in support of local authority mergers overseas,” he said.

Mr Smiddy said that his group had struggled to get practical answers to the many questions it had raised regarding the other option of a boundary extension for Cork city, with many proponents of such a position relying on theoretical models.

The review group thus began to look at international academic research including studies from Europe, Australia and New Zealand. Mr Smiddy cited the findings of Australian academic Chris Aulich, who looked at mergers in Australia and New Zealand.

Mr Smiddy said Prof Aulich had found local authority mergers in both countries had led to single authorities capable of “delivering enhanced levels of services to citizens arising from the pooling of knowledge and expertise”.

Status and image

“A unitary authority in Cork would strengthen the positioning, status and image of Cork city and the entire Cork region nationally and globally, and help spearhead and create a new drive and energy with Cork city as the heartbeat of the region,” he said.

Mr Smiddy pointed out there was a wide divergence of views between those who favoured granting a boundary extension to Cork City Council, with some proponents arguing for extension into Douglas and Blackpool and others larger extensions down to Midleton.

“When one delves into the evidence of 50 years of Cork boundary extension history – which again my committee could just not simply whitewash away – it is indeed a very sad story of boundary extension failure with so much acrimony, division and friction,” he said.

“The people of Cork would not thank me and my committee for repeating the mistakes of history, and putting forward once again a theoretical solution that was unimplementable, unworkable, not feasible or not viable,” he added.

Mr Smiddy said the report argued strongly against a boundary extension as separate authorities would lead to much more divergent and conflicting on what is best for Cork, and planning for more balanced economic and social development would become more difficult.

There were also major financial complexities associated with boundary extensions, including perpetual payments of almost €40 million a year by way of subvention from the city to the county to compensate for the loss of rate revenue in the newly acquired city territory.