Cian O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 39:

"In page 41, line 24, to delete “3, 4 or 5 members” and substitute “4, 5 or 6 members”."

This amendment seeks to change and delete the terms around the constituency sizes and the number of Members per constituency. It would delete "3, 4 or 5 members" and substitute it with "4, 5 or 6 members".

To give some background, there was a very strong public discussion in 2013 in that constitutional convention about how politics operates. It followed a period of crisis in Ireland where in public confidence in political system was knocked following the economic Celtic tiger collapse and all the social challenges and difficulties that arose out of that collapse. Not every idea that was floating around the time has necessarily stood the test of time. However, a considered discussion arose in the citizens’ assembly. One of their recommendations was for all constituencies to have five seats or more. One of the advantages of this would be to improve diversity and to make the Dáil more representative. As the Minister of State has already said, the Dáil and many of our elected chambers across Ireland do not properly reflect and look like our population and the people who live in Ireland. While this amendment alone will not correct that, many of those recommendations from the citizens’ assembly in 2013 have not been implemented and they are not reflected in this Bill. In fact, this particular clause - which I am trying to change - simply copper-fastens the status quo. It is hard to understand why almost ten years on, those recommendations are not being addressed.

I have been extremely moderate in my suggested change. The constitutional convention specified five seats or more. I have been very moderate here in the hopes that the Minister of State might agree. I have therefore suggested four, five or six. I am also mindful of the point was raised earlier in the in the Dáil Chamber that there can be issues in rural areas. We do not want to have redrawings of constituencies where parts of a particular county are shoved in with another county where there is no shared identity etc. Therefore, combinations of four, five and six, particularly in rural areas will give us a much better fit than going larger. However, going larger will certainly work in urban areas and cities without a problem. I am mindful that it can be disempowering and alienating for people in rural areas to be taken out of their county and to be put in with another to which they feel no logical attachment. Maybe we need to get to a situation where we move beyond that, but this would be a good start. It is generally accepted that three-seat constituencies favour larger parties or, as we might say now, some of the medium-sized parties. As a representative of a smaller party, we actually have very good balance between----