Of what personal use is your local councillor/TD?

pog it

With local politicians still hoping to do well in the next election out of people's loyalty to a particular party, or because they attended a funeral, or because they know them well, I'm just wondering if ordinary people who vote for these TDs actually get anything done especially for them?

I know about how the odd person gets planning permission sorted out by their local councillor, etc. but what other benefits can voting "locally" rather than with a "national" perspective get one?

None..

CamperMan

useless and a waste of tax payers money

Liam Byrne

It's not a TD's job to do anything remotely like that.

johngalway

When civil servants won't talk to you, return calls, or acknowledge registered letters, TD's have this magic phone line that get's answers.

As I said on another post. IF any of the systems which deal with the Public worked, there'd be no need to go to TD's.

who the fug

PJ Sheehan was always handy back in the day

whocares86

who the fug wrote: »

PJ Sheehan was always handy back in the day

the guy is thinking of running again. He would be seriously advised not to as he will loose his seat. FG would also make the big mistake of running his son as he would'nt get elected either

http://www.southernstar.ie/article.php?id=2292

flutered

i.m.o. were i live one cannot get any goverment entitlements without having to resorting to getting a f.f. td involved.

username123

We had a situation with an agressive stray dog before and despite a number of calls from neighbours the dog warden just wouldnt show up. After a week I phoned the local FG TD. 20 minutes later the dog warden was on my doorstep - disgruntled too.

Essexboy

I emailed a senior engineer on the county council about a public safety problem: no response.
Emailed the Area Engineer: still no response.

Contacted my local councillor and chairman of the county council. "I will sort that out". What happened? sweet FA!

goose2005

username123 wrote: »

We had a situation with an agressive stray dog before and despite a number of calls from neighbours the dog warden just wouldnt show up. After a week I phoned the local FG TD. 20 minutes later the dog warden was on my doorstep - disgruntled too.

Again, if public services were run well, people wouldn't need to beg favours from their betters. I wonder if said TD had a glance at election records to see what sort of vote s/he got at the last election from your area.

Amhran Nua

Liam Byrne wrote: »

It's not a TD's job to do anything remotely like that.

Councillors haven't much real power, so it all gets lumped onto the TD. The TD in turn spends so much time looking after the local area in order to get re-elected that the national issues go begging. And here we are today, stuck with the single transferable vote and the shiniest parish pumps anywhere.

who the fug

whocares86 wrote: »

the guy is thinking of running again. He would be seriously advised not to as he will loose his seat. FG would also make the big mistake of running his son as he would'nt get elected either

http://www.southernstar.ie/article.php?id=2292

Who else have FG got down there

Lenny Lovett

Let's face it, if our local Councils were running properly by conscientious Management, we wouldn't need Councillors. The majority of Councillors are dealing with getting street lights fixed, footpath repairs, requests for Zebra crossings and the like. If the Councils had a Customer Services representative like most British Councils do we could do away with that particular gravy train too.

bigbluesky

my local councillor?

sure the county manager makes decisions regardless of the elected councillors in dlr coco

he threatens legal action against any who disagree with him

search youtube for
Ruairi Holohan Booterstown
where one councillor became a militant coz of all this

bamboozle

Ivor Callely was great as TD for my consitituency, he kept profits up in local mobile phone shops with all his 'invoices' and driving around his giant landrover sport helped out profits in local petrol stations no end.

in Dublin North Central though we have Richard Bruton who is excellant on local matters. Finian McGrath who in fairness to him publishes all his expenses on his website, although he keeps the fact he votes with the government very quiet, there's also Sean Haughey, sighting's of whom are as frequent as shergar - not suprising when he has never lived in the constituency.

Liam Byrne

bamboozle wrote: »

Ivor Callely was great as TD for my consitituency, he kept profits up in local mobile phone shops with all his 'invoices'.....

How do you keep profits up in companies that no longer exist ?

bmaxi

IMO, councillors are those who have to show to the party bigwigs that they can make it on their own and do not have the favoured qualification of;
(a) being someone's relative.
(b) being able to use a hurley.
(c) being a local publican, who might stand a few pints.
(d) being someway connected to the IFA.
Having said that I have come across one or two councillors who genuinely want to work for the community but these have been Independents, most party affiliated councillors see it only as a staging post on the gravy trail.

mikemac

Our best councillor is an independent, always was an independent. He is a social worker too and involved in pretty much community activity.


I think he's fantastic, the only one to get back to me with any queries.
And is proactive about things

No party to back him up yet he tops the polls everytime.
Put the work in locally and you can do well!
I don't think he's ever run in a general election, so he isn't treating it as one step on the ladder

I've never contacted our TD's so can't realy say much about them