H.E. Mr. Mait Martinson:

On a voting day, no action takes place outside our country, and voting can only take place in-country. All voting procedures abroad, either at an embassy or using Internet voting, would cease four days before the voting day. Deputy Dooley asked about the list system, which is pre-established. A voter permanently residing abroad must determine the electoral district for the election on the basis of a former place of residence in Estonia or a parent's or ancestor's place of residence. It is an automatic process that is very easily determined.

There are still rigid elements in our election process. At this stage, there are approximately 70,000 Estonian citizens living abroad in different states, and that includes residents in the US, Canada and Australia. Taking into account pre-voting at foreign missions, the turnout, as mentioned earlier by the Spanish ambassador, has been low over the past 20 years. It is approximately 5% of the people listed in the embassy. The embassy staff would be busy for two days, with one day at the weekend, leading to extra costs; the process may not be as effective as was hoped.

It seems i-voting is an exercise in names. It has been discussed and I have heard of the experience in Ireland. Electronic voting requires extra effort in approaching people and explaining how the process takes place over the Internet. There is no specific punching machine, for example, and in some places they work and in others they do not. Internet voting is used more often. I have seen articles in newspapers with headlines indicating how e-voting is failing again. E-voting in this case is the use of electronic voting machines, but in Estonia we use the Internet, so how can the Internet fail? If there is no Internet connection for a day, the voting can happen on the next day. There is a time period of ten days, as the process takes place ten to four days before the election day. A vote can be changed three or four times but the last vote, which is made four days before the election date, counts. There is also the possibility of a person physically polling on election day, as it can overturn a vote.