Billy Timmins (Wicklow, Fine Gael)

I refer to Article 16.2.2° of the Constitution, which refers to representation by Deputies of not fewer than 20,000 people and not more than 30,000. Section 6 of the Electoral Act provides that the commission, when examining boundary changes, should ensure the number of Members of the Dáil shall not be fewer than 164 and not more than 168. According to the last census, the population is 4,000,239. If the current rate of population increase continues, the legislation will have to be amended to increase the number of Members within the next ten years or a constitutional referendum will need to be held. There is neither the political will nor public support to increase the number of Members. If anything, the public would like to reduce the number of Members radically but I will not go down that road. However, a constitutional referendum will be necessary to increase the upper limit of representation from 30,000 people. An electoral commission should be set up to examine that issue.

Such a commission should also examine Article 16.2.3°, which refers to the ratio of Members to population in that it should be equitable in so far as is practicable. A court judgment in this regard stated a balance should be struck within plus or minus 10%. That is all well and good but, based on demographics over the past few decades, the population has moved significantly towards the east coast and this geographic imbalance will result in the east coast having significant representation in the Dáil. I tried to articulate a view on this a few years ago and it was misinterpreted. I was depicted as being in favour of two rural Deputies for every urban Deputy. However, this issue must be examined in order that counties such as Kerry, Mayo and Donegal are not denuded of representation, resulting in a huge geographic imbalance.

Where parts of counties have been lost to other counties, their names should be included in the constituency title. For example, parts of Offaly were lost to County Tipperary. The commission should examine proposals for multi-seat and single seat constituencies, as enunciated by Deputy Dempsey previously, the spend between elections and the life span of Ministers. A number of Ministers have grown old. Deputy Dempsey will say it is better to grow old in office than in Opposition but I have concerns about a Minister serving for 15 or 20 years, given the workload involved. We have ample evidence in recent years of them becoming stale. Deputies Scanlon and Nolan should be given an opportunity to sit in Cabinet or my colleagues in opposition should be given an opportunity to do the job.

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