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

There is something a little incongruous about our debating and voting on this legislation in so far as none of us, as elected politicians, can claim complete objectivity when it comes to the redrawing of constituencies. That is not to take away from the legitimacy of the points raised by colleagues. We absolutely have a right to debate the legislation underpinning the establishment of electoral commissions and we certainly should scrutinise their reports to determine whether they adhere to the terms of reference. However, we must be careful about getting into discussions as to whether we agree with and accept the commission's recommendations, because those recommendations may have a direct bearing on how easy or difficult it is for us to get elected on the next occasion.

There is a very difficult balance for any commission to achieve in terms of getting the ratios right, respecting existing county, local authority and community boundaries and getting the urban-rural balance correct. I do not envy the commission members in tackling any of those matters. If the issues Deputies have raised had not been addressed in they way they were, there would be another group of Deputies complaining about the alternative solution. This is not easy work and I acknowledge the efforts of the commission in preparing the report.

While my own constituency is not affected on this occasion, a previous local government boundary review brought about some changes on its periphery. While they had no negative impact on my election bid, having spoken to people living in rural Brittas and Saggart, on the divide between the local electoral area, LEA, and the general election boundary, many felt that their local councillors were not necessarily serving them because they were in a neighbouring general election constituency and their Deputies were not necessarily serving them because they are in a neighbouring LEA. These are genuine concerns and I am not arguing that we should be discounted from raising them.

While it is not pertinent to the legislation before us, I would be open to a consultation on or review of the constitutional limit. However, any such exercise would have to be based on the need to achieve a better balance between the different components of the process, not making it easier for sitting politicians to secure their re-election. I do not in any way suggest that Members who referred to the constitutional limit did so for anything other than genuine purposes. However, for the public to have faith in such a process, we must make that very clear.

Sinn Féin is joining other groups in supporting the Bill. It would be wrong for the Oireachtas to set about amending the commission's recommendations. As I said, if Members wish to change the process for determining boundaries, whether in respect of the constitutional limit or the way the terms of reference are set for the commission membership, that is a legitimate matter for us to debate. Today, however, we have a set of recommendations from an independent commission and the right thing to do, notwithstanding the individual difficulties for some of us arising out of those recommendations, is to support them.

Constituencies with a larger number of seats are more representative because they afford a greater representation of the political views of constituents. While larger parties often prefer constituencies to have a smaller number of seats and Independents and smaller parties usually prefer a larger number, the more important consideration is that having a larger number usually gives a better reflection of the diversity of opinion within the constituency. In future, therefore, we should look to having more constituencies with a larger number of seats, purely for the representational and proportionate balance they offer.

There is strong merit in having a standing independent electoral office similar to that which operates in the North so that we do not have to establish ad hoccommissions after every census. There are obvious benefits in having a proper, professional body whose job is not only to maintain a rolling review of constituencies, boundaries and seat numbers but also to deal with issues of electoral registration, centralisation and scrutiny of the register and so on. A body like that would develop experience over time and might include former politicians or former Oireachtas staff among its membership. I urge the Government to look at this issue in a more rounded way in the future.

To reiterate, I respect the views expressed by Members this evening. However, having set up an independent commission, agreed its terms of reference and let it do its job, we should not necessarily engage in criticism of its decisions, although some of them are difficult for voters and communities in our constituencies or for individual Deputies. We should acknowledge the commission's achievement in doing the job we tasked it do and we should support the report it has produced. For the future, rather than waiting for the next report, we should set about, possibly on an appropriate cross-party basis, finding a way of ensuring the process for setting electoral boundaries is improved in order that we no longer encounter the difficulties colleagues have articulated today.

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