Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael)

Further to the point the previous speaker was making on the electoral register, in the Dublin city and county area it is possible to have two local authorities in the one constituency. Which local authority has responsibility for that whole constituency? The Dún Laoghaire constituency has lost a seat and Dublin South has retained its five seats. However, Dublin South stretches from the edge of Firhouse right down to Loughlinstown hospital. The northern end of Dublin South is in the South Dublin County Council area. Part of that constituency is in one local authority area and the other part is in the Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council area. I agree some agency, possibly the Department, should be responsible for ensuring the maintenance of a proper register to allow people to exercise their franchise whenever an election might be called.

I share Deputy O'Rourke's concern. There is nothing worse than people arriving at a polling booth and finding that their names are not on the register. This can happen despite the fact that people might have lived in the same house for years. In a modern democracy with all the technology available surely it is not beyond the wit of man to find some system. I do not profess to be sufficiently qualified to offer a solution. However, there are plenty of people around and if we ask them for their advice I am sure they would be only too willing to give it to us.

It has been proven that Irish people have a particular interest in elections. In between elections people give out about politicians, day in and day out. When it comes to the contest they are tuned into their televisions and radios to hear the results and it is part and parcel of the whole thing. The ratings go way up on the night of a general election count. Although people are really interested, we have done everything in our power to destroy their interest. I will give a small example. We introduced voting machines. Who ever asked for them? I never knocked on a door where somebody said to me: "Listen, Deputy Barrett, could you do something about getting rid of this pencil and paper? Is there not a machine we could use?" In the 34 years since I was first elected to public life I never heard one person complain about getting a pencil to put "1, 2, 3" on a piece of paper. Yet we decided that because another country did it, we too should have voting machines.

I often think of poor former Deputy Nora Owen, who was a great colleague here. The manner in which that woman was treated on the night of that famous announcement was disgraceful. Given that weaknesses were discovered in the electronic voting system, to this day I am sure she often wonders whether she was cheated out of her seat. That should never be the case. I do not see anything wrong if it takes 24 hours to physically count the votes. We can all go in along with our tellers and all the rest of it and see the pieces of paper being opened in front of us. If there is a recount and it takes another day, so what? Let us get rid of this notion.

While I know it is not directly the responsibility of the Minister of State, Deputy Finneran, he is a man of great influence in the Department. Would somebody please get rid of these machines for once and for all? It is costing the taxpayer between €1 million and €2 million each year to store machines that only have a lifespan of 20 years. They were bought approximately seven or eight years ago. We should put up our hands and say that it was a bad idea and, even though it has cost the taxpayer €52 million, get rid of them. We could give them to somebody else if they want to play around with them and see if there is anything they can do with them — perhaps turn them into gaming machines or something. They will not be used as voting machines. Let us be honest about it and not add on another €1 million a year or whatever it costs to store them.

At this stage I am all in favour of recognising that the Irish people are quite happy with their pinn luaidhe agus píosaí páipéir as the former Taoiseach said. They like marking "1, 2, and 3" and have never complained about it. As former Deputy John Kelly, God rest him, who was famous in this place for making common sense speeches, said "if it is not broke don't fix it". The system should be left alone. It is part and parcel of Irish life. Although they have pressed buttons in the United States that did not turn out to be very successful as far as Al Gore was concerned. Let them continue to do it over there. We like what we are doing here and people are not complaining about it.

I want to make a general point about reducing the Dún Laoghaire constituency by one seat. I realise that a commission given the job of reviewing boundaries will need to take difficult decisions. I am not qualified to talk about rural areas. There are plenty of other Members who are qualified to talk about rural areas and the effects of taking bits of counties and putting them in with other counties. I can understand the difficulties that causes for many people because people are loyal to their counties and like to be represented by their Offaly Deputy, Meath Deputy or whatever it may be. The commission has fiddled around with the boundaries in Dublin many times. Deputy Gregory must be the greatest survivor as an Independent Deputy. As long as I have been in this House, every time there was a constituency boundary revision, Dublin Central was the first to get the hammer. It has been moved all over the place. Deputy Gregory has managed to survive which says much for his work.

The part of the Dún Laoghaire constituency to be moved into Dublin South is the part that will be developed in the future. I recently read a Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council report which anticipates a population in Cherrywood of 32,000, with 18,000 jobs planned. That is the target for Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown. That part of the Dún Laoghaire constituency is the very part the commission has been taken out and put into Dublin South. If it were necessary to redraw the boundaries and the Dún Laoghaire constituency were to lose a seat, it would have been far better to take an established part of the constituency at the other end to join in. It is inevitable that in a subsequent revision those boundaries will need to change it again.

Like previous speakers, I believe there should be a fixed term so that people are guaranteed this will not be changed every five years or whatever. Provisions in the Bill will permit the commission to review boundaries after the initial census figures are published. People like to have certainty. The part that has gone from my constituency, which has been with me for the 30 odd years I have been a councillor and Deputy, is very much part of Dún Laoghaire — it is not just the votes. It is totally foreign to what is in Dublin South. There is no connection between Firhouse in the South Dublin County Council area and the southern part of the existing Dún Laoghaire constituency. There is not even a bus service — they do not connect with each other.

We have to be careful about who sits on these commissions. I do not wish to criticise the integrity of those who served in the past but there is a need for people who know and understand the areas involved. One likes to think they walked the territory. I do not think the same commission should deal with urban and rural areas. The maximum number of seats is 166. One has to look at both rural and urban areas and arrive at a solution on the 166 seats. The hiving off of some part of an urban area to make up the numbers upsets people as they do not have the connection and it is not good for representation.

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