Robert Dowds (Dublin Mid West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank all our visitors for turning up. I apologise for having to be out of the room for some time because of some of the demands of this place. I strongly agree with the comments that have been made about the register of voters. I agree with the witnesses and the speakers on this side who have said there are very serious problems in that regard. This issue alone presents a very good case for having an electoral commission.

I would like to make two other points, the first of which was made by Dr. Reidy at the beginning of her presentation. We need to recognise that we are a strong democracy and that we have a strong and long tradition of unbroken democracy. I think there are just four or five countries in Europe that have had such a tradition since the time we became an independent state. It is something we should cherish because it is not something any of us should take for granted.

I would also like to ask about the drawing of electoral boundaries. It seems from what Deputy Maloney said to me that the witnesses may have touched on this.

At the moment, in some instances, they are drawn in a ridiculous way. To take the area Deputy McLoughlin represents, the Sligo-Leitrim constituency will now have west Cavan and south Donegal in the same constituency as Enniscrone in the west of Sligo, which is ridiculous. I could give other examples. There is a good example where part of south Mayo was put into west Galway, which is another bit of lunacy. If it had to be put into Galway, it would have made far more sense to put it in with east Galway because at least Tuam is nearby, which would be a centre. I do not know whether the commission would be involved in trying to iron out that kind of ridiculous nonsense, which no retired politician who was involved would inflict on anybody.