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

We support that fully. We have some of Europe's leading scholars in this area who spend a very significant amount of time in other jurisdictions relaying to their expertise. Exit studies have a huge value. Mr. O'Leary is absolutely right; any longitudinal study also needs to be able to talk to the people who do not vote. In the testimony we got from the political science community via Dr. Theresa Reidy, Professor David Farrell and others, in fact, one of the things they certainly impressed upon me was that there was a period during the Celtic tiger when there was more money. Significant amounts of State funding were put into exit polls that tell us not just the result of the election. They actually have a volume of data that is so important, but that data is only valuable if it is repeated over a longitudinal period as well. Therefore, I urge Mr. O'Leary to not discount that deeper level of exit polling study as part of that wider project. Again, Dr. Reidy, Professor Farrell and others made the case to us at committee that it is as important to try to identify those people who do not vote and identify why they do not vote and engage with them over periods of time or ask why people vote in certain types of elections and not others. Our turnout in local elections is 10 or 15 percentage points lower, depending on the particular election, than a general election. That is really good news because that would be a hugely important element of the commission's work.