David Stanton (Cork East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for his thoughtful response and his own personal commitment to work in this area. It is of great importance that it is moved forward as soon as possible. People are extraordinarily disappointed because they see themselves being disenfranchised if they cannot actually vote. People are paying their taxes and are working and raising their families here and just because they are away on holidays, or for whatever other reason as the Minister of State has alluded to, we should put these arrangements in place. The examples, as I have mentioned, of the UK, Australia, and New Zealand clearly demonstrate that with the implementation of stringent measures and clear guidelines, this can be done. These countries established secure systems that ensure the integrity of the vote while providing accessibility to all eligible citizens.

Furthermore, our current postal voting system for specific groups has already set a precedent. We have proven that we can run a secure and efficient postal voting system. Expanding this to include citizens who are temporarily away is a natural progression, not an unprecedented leap. By learning from the best practices of other democracies, we can tailor our system to mitigate any potential risks.

This will not add much to the administrative burden either because it is already in place because, as we know, we already have postal voting in place. As the Minister of State has said, modern technology can also streamline the application and verification process making it manageable and efficient. With proper handling and the allocation of resources, this can be done. Other democracies have managed it and I have also come across the system of proxy voting in some instances which, perhaps, we should also look at.

I am delighted that the commission is working on this. If the senior Minister wrote to the commission a year ago and it is now that it is actually responding, this demonstrates that it takes a long time to get anything done in this country. I am not sure whether or not it will be possible to have this done for the next general election, which we do not know will happen perhaps in either the autumn or the spring, but I would hope that the Minister of State, his colleagues and the commission would move to ensure that that would be the situation.

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