Paul Kehoe (Wexford, Fine Gael)
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Question 918: To ask the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government the cost to date of the consultancy design, manufacture, transport, security, storage and training in each local authority area since the inception of electronic voting machines. [28821/08]

John Gormley (Dublin South East, Green Party)
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The total expenditure on the development and roll-out of the electronic voting system to date in respect of all constituencies is some €51.3m, the bulk of which has been incurred in purchasing the voting machines and ancillary equipment. In addition, based on figures received in my Department from Returning Officers, the total annual costs for storage of the electronic voting equipment (including the cost of insurance, service charges, rates, heating, etc.) for 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007, were some €658,000, €696,000, €706,000 and €489,000 respectively. Based on recent provisional information from Returning Officers, a total of some €139,000 has been expended to date in 2008 in respect of storage of the electronic voting equipment. Full annual cost data are provided to my Department at the end of each year, and a more definitive figure for 2008 will be available in due course.

In 2007, over 60% of the electronic voting machines (4,762 in total) were moved to a central storage facility located at Gormanston Army Camp. Costs incurred to date in respect of the movement and storage of this equipment are some €328,000. These are largely one-off costs related to the preparation of the facility, transportation of the machines and the acquisition of storage containers. The available capacity at this location has now been fully utilised. A full breakdown of all of these costs is set out in Table 1.

Responsibility for the security and safe storage of manual voting electoral materials (such as ballot boxes, stamping instruments, and stationery) has been a matter for the Returning Officers, who are statutorily responsible for conducting the polls. Accordingly, similar responsibility was assigned to them in relation to the storage of the electronic voting machines and equipment. Information on local storage and related costs is therefore provided on the basis of constituency, rather than local authority area. Based on the figures received in my Department from Returning Officers, the total annual costs for storage of the electronic voting equipment (including the cost of insurance, service charges, rates, heating, etc.), for each constituency, are set out in the Table 2.

Paul Kehoe (Wexford, Fine Gael)
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Question 919: To ask the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government his views on terminating the electronic voting machine project and transferring funding to meet the needs of persons currently awaiting modification to their houses under the essential repair and disabled persons scheme. [28822/08]

John Gormley (Dublin South East, Green Party)
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I am at present considering the next steps to be taken in relation to the electronic voting project. In this, I am taking into account the work of the Commission on Electronic Voting, which has examined the system, relevant experiences and developments internationally, the need to maintain public confidence in the electoral process, as well as the provisions in the Programme for Government relating to electoral reform generally.

In any event, most of the costs associated with the electronic voting and counting project, including local storage and related costs, are met by the Department of Finance through the Central Fund, and therefore could not be transferred for alternative use as set out in the question.