Paschal Mooney (Fianna Fail)

In my initial contribution I attempted to suggest that, in the context of the amendment tabled by my group proposing that an interim report be published for public consultation, I was questioning the need or desirability of having a constituency commission at all. I referred to an article by Mr. John Coakley, the detail of which I have already acknowledged in my earlier contribution.

Mr. Coakley suggests that a great deal of trouble in regard to the revision of constituencies could have been avoided by the adoption of a simple formula that is close to being universal in proportional representation systems. I refer to the definition of permanent constituency boundaries established by legislation in the early 1920s, modified by a few minor local adjustments in subsequent years with seats being reallocated between constituencies by means of a simple mathematical formula after each population census.

He goes on to argue, and I would agree, that the introduction of proportional representation by the Government of Ireland Act 1920 for the two parts of the newly-partitioned Ireland entailed the creation of multi-member constituencies and would have permitted a return to counties or groups of counties as the basis for new electoral districts. Instead, existing constituencies were grouped in peculiar ways to produce a set of 26 territorial units returning between three and eight members each.

This is the basis of my argument. If we were to adopt the basic administrative district as the boundaries of a constituency we could avoid a lot of what is happening. To illustrate the point, entities such as King's County and Queen's County, which are now Laois and Offaly - Offaly is the only constituency in the entire country to have retained its status as an entity since 1920-----