City Status in Ireland - Republic of Ireland

Republic of Ireland

See also: Local government in the Republic of Ireland

The Local Government (Ireland) Act 1898 abolished the corporate counties of the city of Kilkenny and the towns of Galway and Drogheda (and Carrickfergus in what would become Northern Ireland). The Act redesignated the other corporate counties as county boroughs. After Partition, four of these were in the Irish Free State, subsequently the Republic of Ireland. Galway was made a fifth county borough in 1985. The Local Government Act 2001 redesignates the five county boroughs" as cities. These cities, like the county boroughs before them, are almost identical in power and function to the administrative counties. The five administrative cities are Cork, Dublin, Galway, Limerick, and Waterford.

In 2011, it was announced that Limerick City Council and Limerick County Council would be merged after the 2014 local elections. In 2012, when a possible merger of Waterford City Council and Waterford County Council was discussed in the Seanad, Phil Hogan, Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, stated that Waterford's city status would in any event be retained.