Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I strongly support Deputy O'Callaghan on this. The Minister of State will know that we have a significant number of people who are in and out of the homeless system for a very long time. That does not mean that they are not politically engaged or that they do not want to be engaged with the process. We have to make it as easy as possible for those groups of people. The idea of an annual registration seems almost punitive. I completely accept that the nature of the accommodation and of the emergency accommodation system may mean that such people may not be at a given address in subsequent years or may be at multiple addresses. People can be in and out of two, three or four different hostels in the space of 12 months. I can just see no justification for this. I fully accept that the Minister of State is trying to clean the electoral register, but we are talking about a small number of people and, at that, an even smaller number who are likely to be registered and engaged. That is why I urge the Minister of State, if the briefing notes in front of him do not allow him to stifle us this time, to go away and to look at this. There can be no reason why people who want to vote, simply because of circumstances not of their making, would be prevented from doing so by an onerous requirement. I appeal to the Minister of State and the wisdom of his officials to find a fix to this.