Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour) | Oireachtas source

----- and hopefully we will not have an election too early in the new year.

Even in the McGrath and Murphy case of 2007 which the Minister of State quoted, there was a reference to an urgent burden on the Oireachtas following the census. It is quite a significant argument but one which happily has now passed us by.

I have tabled an amendment and Deputies Cowen and Breathnach have tabled amendments that are very similar to mine. In none of those amendments do we question the commission's decisions regarding boundaries and representation but we are questioning the names of the constituencies. Deputy Thomas Byrne referred to how the Louth constituency takes in a significant portion of east Meath but does not name it. There are smaller parts of other constituencies that have also been brought in and not named, but in that area there was concern among the people in the coastal area of Meath that they were not part of the constituency name. We are not questioning the substance of what the commission is recommending but I would like to know who decides the names.

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