Thomas Gould (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein)
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I want to raise a number of issues in regard to the electoral reform Bill on which I would welcome the opinion of Ms McMahon and Ms Sparks. In my parts of my constituency, voter turnout is very low. In terms of the electoral register, in some cases, only 25% of those registered are voting. A lack of knowledge around how to vote appears to be an issue. In that regard, in previous elections, we distributed sample ballot papers to try to encourage more people to engage in the voting process. When the European and local elections or a referendum are being held at the same time the number of spoiled votes is high. We believe this is down to people either not being used to voting or unable to manage the process. Sinn Féin wants to work to get more people to vote. As mentioned earlier, we need everyone entitled to vote to engage in the process and vote. I would welcome the witnesses' thoughts on that issue. I will come in again later, time permitting.