Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 7 July 2015

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Environment, Culture and the Gaeltacht

Electoral Commission in Ireland: Discussion (Resumed)

4:00 pm

Mr. Domhnall McGlacken-Byrne:

Deputy McEntee mentioned part of my document. I said, in that section, that the high turnout and fantastic images need to act as an incentive.

The Deputy asked why people spoil their votes. As I have already said, the questions on the ballot paper for the marriage referendum were binary and simple. The question was: Do you want gay people to be able to marry or not? If a greater effort or resource was established whereby, as in the Carlow-Kilkenny by-election, one could vote for a person based on his or her stance on a certain issue, then there would be a greater and clearer cause-and-effect relationship when one votes for one party or another. As Deputy Stanley said before he left, it would be useful to make a resource available that would clarify what voting for one person versus voting for another person actually entails. All of this information would go some way to generating the same clear relationship that was established in the marriage referendum, which I think led to the brilliant turnout.

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