Ciarán Cuffe (Dún Laoghaire, Green Party)

I welcome the legislation in broad terms. It is timely and proper that the constituencies are revised and it is important a transparent process was used to do so. I raised my eyebrows slightly at the parameters for population used to define the revised constituencies, as they went slightly beyond what we traditionally took as the relatively narrow bandwidth within which population numbers fell. However, I recognise that some respect must be paid to geographical areas and county boundaries to ensure consistency. My party and I welcome the end of the dual mandate. We hope that at last local authority members will be given proper powers and responsibilities.

I offer my sympathy to County Clare, which always seems to be the odd man out in these revisions. It seems to shift from south to north to west and back again, which must place the county in a difficult position, and its aspiring candidates for European elections are also in a difficult position. They do not know if they will be in the south, west or north of Ireland. Clare is in the new north-west constituency but maybe that should be called north and west. A new note is being struck here which might cause confusion among interested parties.

It is interesting to see the options that were chosen. The dramatic option would have been to put all the areas under consideration into one 13 seat constituency and we would have welcomed a debate on that option. We feel one large constituency might lead to more representation for voices which are not often heard, while the choice of three three-seat constituencies will probably make it more difficult for smaller parties, my own included, to win seats. When I was a city councillor, I was in a constituency which went from five seats to three and it was very difficult to win representation for a smaller party in a three-seat constituency. It will be difficult for us to win in a three-seater but we will have a good candidate and I do not doubt that she will be elected.

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