Martin Conway (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the imminent announcement of the medium-term economic plan which is taking place today. We can certainly go forward with a new sense of renewal following the exit from the bailout. However, it is always worthwhile to remember that the human cost of the recession is still impacting on and being felt by hundreds of thousands of our citizens, people who lost their jobs and those in severe negative equity who are trying to hold onto their homes, come to arrangements with banks and so on. While the plan is positive and very welcome, I would like to take time to share solidarity with those who are suffering the human cost of what we have been through. I hope the future will be brighter for them and that the benefits of what we have seen will percolate down to them sooner rather than later.

With regard to the meetings taking place on the future of the House, I raised previously the importance of ensuring that future elections to this House are more inclusive than they have been. I would like to see the new university panel, in particular, having a facility whereby people with vision impairments will be able to vote electronically. I believe this would be an ideal opportunity to create further equality and take a further step in the direction of electoral equality. I was contacted recently by a university graduate who feels disenfranchised by the fact he cannot vote without a third party being involved. With the upcoming legislation, we have an opportunity to put a mechanism in place to facilitate university graduates who are blind or visually impaired so they can vote independently.