Perhaps I am, but the fact of the matter is that Deputy Dunne knows as well as I that this is the only prospect these people see and that they would be anxious to be genuine candidates in reasonably-sized areas rather than have the present position. I admit in regard to this question as to whether there has been public demand that none of these people has asked me to make this move, but still we know that the feeling of frustration is there.
In 1959, a revision of constituencies was made in accordance with the Article of the Constitution which provides that such a revision must be made at least once in every 12 years, and that revision of the constituencies was made in accordance with the principles that have operated here since 1922. I have already quoted Article 16. 2. 3º of the Constitution, and in that Article the phrase "as far as is practicable" has always been interpreted as meaning that reasonable account should be taken of such practical considerations as administrative boundaries and of geographical features, and the revision of constituencies that was made in 1959 was carried out in this way. The revision that was then made was accepted unanimously in this House, but it was challenged in the High Court by a private individual, and we all know the decision that was given by the Court. This was to the effect that these practical considerations could not be taken into account but that a revision of constituencies must aim at achieving mathematical accuracy in regard to the ratio of population per Deputy in each constituency, and Judge Budd indicated that a maximum deviation from the national average of 1,000 was tolerable.
The result of this was that a new revision of constituencies had to be made. This was done on the basis of keeping the mutilation of counties to an absolute minimum, but despite this it was found necessary to do a number of illogical and, in my opinion, quite inequitable things. It was necessary, for instance, to detach from County Louth a considerable number of the population and to attach them to Monaghan. Part of Meath and Westmeath had to be attached to Kildare. Part of Wexford had to be attached to Carlow-Kilkenny, these two counties having already been joined together for the purpose of this system. Part of County Waterford had to be added to South Tipperary, part of County Roscommon to County Mayo, part of Leitrim to Roscommon, and the remainder of Leitrim to Sligo.
Despite what Deputies have been saying here, not everybody was satisfied with these provisions. In fact, even in this debate, Deputy Treacy referred to the gerrymandering of the Tipperary and Waterford constituencies under the Electoral Act of 1961. He asserted that the county had been dismembered in a savage way at the behest of the former Deputy Loughman and primarily to unseat Deputy Kyne, but in actual fact, he knows that this savage dismemberment, as he describes it, was carried out only as a result of a decision by the High Court that this kind of thing had to be done, whether or not it suited the people in the areas. Practical considerations could not be taken into account. Deputy Treacy should know that under the Electoral Act of 1959, which was the one made in accordance with the usual interpretation of the phrase in the Constitution, County Tipperary North Riding, Tipperary South Riding and Waterford were each left as separate Dáil constituencies without any "savage dismemberment". This measure was accepted as rational by all Parties here when before the Oireachtas. It was only when it was challenged in the courts and this decision given that these illogical things had to be done and that these "savage dismemberments", as Deputy Treacy said, had to be carried out. I fully agree with his description.
Justice Budd's decision was, in effect, that the revision of constituencies was a purely statistical and administrative problem—one that, as Deputy Dunne has noticed, changes with each census and not with each 12 years as mentioned in the Constitution. The problem as it existed at that time had to be solved in the way I have mentioned. Of the numerous possible ways it could be solved, this was the one that appeared to be the least objectionable, although of course it was very objectionable indeed to the people concerned—the people taken out of constituencies to which they had always belonged and transferred into other areas with which they had no affinity. I may say it was also objectionable to the Party organisations in these areas.
This mathematical problem could, of course, have been solved in a number of different ways. For example, that part of the problem that involved the attaching of portion of Louth to Monaghan and, further down, the same problem which required that slices of Meath and Westmeath be added to Kildare, this could have been dealt with in another way which could have involved the transfer of population from North County Dublin to Meath or from Meath to North County Dublin, or the transfer of population from South County Dublin to Kildare or from Kildare to South County Dublin. This is the kind of thing that may have to happen in future if the change we are proposing is not made.
Deputy Dunne in his contribution referred to such well-known indoor games as chess and ludo. I do not know if Deputy Dunne's recreational activities extend to jig-saw puzzles. If they do, he could spend many a long hour amusing himself with working out the possible solutions to comply with the requirements of the High Court in regard to the revision of constituencies in present circumstances. All the equipment he needs is a copy of the census and a map showing the electoral areas and townlands and a street map for the built-up areas. He does not have to think of such things as county boundaries, rivers or lakes, mountains or peninsulas. He does not have to think in terms of human beings. They are mere shuttlecocks to be moved about at will. If these people, in being transferred every five years from one area to another, get the feeling that somebody is playing the three-card trick with them, that does not matter. They are not to be considered at all. Their interests do not count. Mathematical accuracy is the only consideration, according to the judicial interpretation of the words of the Constitution.
In devising possible solutions to the problem as it exists, Deputy Dunne will not have to consider such things as county boundaries. These exist. We who contest elections know that they are real things, but the High Court has ruled they are not relevant. In revising constituencies, we can do such things as putting a chunk of the north side of Dublin in with the south side of Dublin or vice versa. Clare can be adjusted with Limerick or Kerry and Tipperary with Clare, Offaly with Galway, Westmeath and Longford with Roscommon.
The existence of the Shannon and its lakes and estuary is completely irrelevant. Even without these complications, the job of revising constituencies to comply with the present judicial requirement would be an absorbing pastime and an infinite number of solutions would be available. The exercise would be on a somewhat higher mental level than ludo, but would hardly be as involved as chess. I think Deputy Dunne, provided he could spare the time from looking after the huge constituency he has to cover at present, could spend many an enjoyable hour working out the different solutions possible.
I think he will find some of them very interesting indeed. For instance, one type of solution that would continually crop up would have the effect of placing himself and his colleague, Deputy Tully, in the same constituency. No doubt that would be a very interesting situation indeed. I feel sure that some of his professorial friends, who have been making such amusing and fanciful forecasts with regard to what would happen under the type of electoral system we are proposing, would assure him that in such a rearrangement, only one of them would survive. One thing is certain. It is doubtful if even one constituency, as they are at present constituted, would be left untouched in a new revision based on the 1966 census. Indeed, comparatively few counties would not have their boundaries breached.
There are at present 38 constituencies. As I said, Justice Budd indicated that a maximum deviation from the national average, which is approximately 20,000 of the population per Deputy, of 1,000 would be permitted. Of these 38 constituencies, there are at present a total of 14 which come within this range. There are 18 in which the population per Deputy is too low and there are six in which the population per Deputy is too high, according to this interpretation of the Constitution. This means that 24 of the existing constituencies would have to be changed to comply with the decision of the High Court in this matter. Of course, to change these 24 would involve most, if not all, of the others, due to the desirability from the practical point of view of having constituencies continuous, that is, not having a part of a constituency cut off from the rest of it by the intervention of another constituency.
I say that this would be necessary from the practical point of view because anybody who had any experience of the practicalities of elections would try to achieve this. Of course the Constitution, according to the judicial interpretation, does not in fact require this to be done. It would apparently be quite permissible to top-up the constituencies in which the population per Deputy is too low by the transfer of population from those constituencies in which the population is too high. For instance, the deficiency in the constituency of Donegal South-West might conceivably be adjusted by attaching the residents of Errigal Road to that constituency. Indeed, that might not be any more illogical than what otherwise must happen, the transference of portion of the population of Sligo-Leitrim to Donegal, or the transference of portion of the population of Donegal to the constituency of Sligo-Leitrim. This kind of thing may sound ridiculous, but it would not be contrary to the Constitution.
Only a High Court judge or someone who had never had any experience of elections would in fact contemplate doing anything like this. No one with any experience of the practicalities of election work would decide to adjust a constituency that required to be adjusted in accordance with the interpretation of the Constitution except by transferring the population from a neighbouring constituency. That would mean inevitably that practically every constituency in the country would have to be interfered with.
As I said, there are at present 14 of the 38 constituencies which come within the tolerance laid down by a High Court decision. Some of them are very near the upper limit, and some are near the lower limit. These 14 could just get by and not be interfered with, were it not for the fact that they would inevitably be involved in the adjustment called for in the remaining 24 constituencies. The 14 constituencies which are all right according to the present interpretation are Carlow-Kilkenny, which of course has already been made up to the requirement by the transfer of portion of Wexford constituency, Cork Borough, North-East Cork, Dublin South-West, West Galway, Kildare, which of course is a constituency which comes within the tolerance because it has already been adjusted by the addition of parts of Westmeath and Meath, Laois-Offaly, East Limerick, Louth, which of course has already been mutilated by the transference of portions of the population to Monaghan, Meath, which has already had portion of its population transferred to Kildare, South Tipperary, Waterford, which again has been mutilated by the transference of part of the population across the Comeragh Mountains to South Tipperary, Wexford, which has already suffered in the same way by the transfer of population to Carlow-Kilkenny, and Wicklow.
This does not mean that these constituencies could necessarily be left as they are. For instance, while Cork Borough and North-East Cork could remain as they are, if they could be treated in isolation, the other two constituencies in Cork county would not comply with the requirements of the High Court decision. Similarly while the Dublin South-West constituency is all right as it is, the other constituencies in Dublin are not, and it would hardly be possible to make the required adjustments in the other areas without interfering also with Dublin South-West.
Similarly, while the constituency of West Galway could continue as it is, if it could be considered in isolation, East Galway does not come within the present requirement, and, therefore, whatever solution would be found to the problem of East Galway would very likely involve West Galway as well. The present constituency of Kildare is all right but Westmeath-Longford is not and the solution to that problem might require the return of the population from Westmeath that was transferred to Kildare the last time. This would involve further complications which could well involve portions of South County Dublin such as the Rathcoole and Lucan areas being transferred to Kildare, or portions of Kildare being associated with a Dublin constituency.
Similarly, while East Limerick is within the tolerance provision permitted by the High Court decision, West Limerick is not. Therefore in any adjustment of that constituency, East Limerick also would have to be interfered with. The constituency of Louth as at present constituted would be permissible, but Monaghan is not within the present permitted tolerance, and a solution there might require the return to Louth of the population taken from Louth and this could cause a further chain reaction which might involve the county of Meath, and possibly Dublin County. Again, while South Tipperary as at present constituted complies with the requirement, North Tipperary does not. An adjustment here might also involve the county of Waterford because, as Deputy Treacy pointed out, some of the population of Waterford had to be attached to South Tipperary on the last occasion.
There are 18 constituencies in which the population per Deputy is too low, according to the present requirements. These are Cavan, Clare, South-West Cork, North-East Donegal, South-West Donegal, Dublin North-Central, Dublin South-Central, East Galway, North Kerry, South Kerry, West Limerick, Longford-Westmeath, North Mayo, South Mayo, Monaghan, Roscommon, Sligo-Leitrim and North Tipperary. In the other six constituencies, the population per Deputy is too high. These are Mid-Cork, Dublin North-East, Dublin North-West, Dublin South-East, Dublin County and Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown. So far as can be seen from a preliminary examination of what might be required, certainly the only one of the existing constituencies in the west of Ireland that could conceivably be left untouched is West Galway and it is extremely doubtful, in view of the situation that would have to be dealt with in Mayo and East Galway.
I think it desirable to give some examples of what would have to happen to effect the revision of the constituencies which Deputy Dunne, Deputy O'Leary and Deputy Sweetman have been pressing for since the publication of the census in 1966. It seems that the most feasible solution for Cavan and Monaghan, in both of which the ratio of population to Deputies is too low at present, would be to join the two counties together and form a five-seat constituency instead of the present two three-seat constituencies. Deputies will appreciate how much simpler their job would be with a constituency extending almost 70 miles across Ireland than in the present situation where they have only one of these counties to cover. That could be the solution there. Another possibility would be, of course, that Cavan and Leitrim would be joined together, or portion of them. I think the people in the counties of Cavan and Monaghan will know how appropriate such a joining together of those two counties would be.
The situation in Clare would have to be dealt with either by changing it to a three-seat constituency and transferring some of the population to a Galway constituency, or by retaining it as a four-seat constituency, which would involve the transference of some of the Galway population to the constituency of Clare. This is, of course, assuming that we take account of the existence of the Shannon and do not deal with it by transferring population from a constituency situated on the opposite side of the Shannon. If there were no other complications in the situation, East Galway could probably be dealt with in this way, by adjustment with County Clare, but there are other complications involving a chain reaction starting in Donegal and probably affecting Galway, through Sligo-Leitrim and Mayo.
In Donegal, the situation could conceivably be dealt with either by making the county a five-seat constituency and transferring portion of the population to the constituency of Sligo-Leitrim, or else by retaining the present six seats in two Donegal constituencies, making adjustments in the constituency boundaries and adding on portions of Sligo and portion of Leitrim. Anybody familiar with the geography there would see it would not be feasible to do it by adding only portion of one of those counties. The Sligo-Leitrim constituency is obviously due for a further mutilation either by receiving portion of the population from Donegal or by giving some of the population to Donegal. This would involve further adjustments from the present Roscommon constituency, or possibly from Mayo.
The present constituency of Roscommon-Leitrim would also obviously require adjustment with the constituency of Sligo-Leitrim and probably again with Mayo. In the case of County Mayo, there would have to be adjustments between the present North and South Mayo constituencies and possibly also with Roscommon-Leitrim and Galway. Longford-Westmeath could conceivably be dealt with by the return of portion of Westmeath which was transferred to Kildare in the last revision, but this would have consequential effects on the constituency of Kildare as at present constituted. The only feasible way of dealing with County Kerry would be either by taking in portion of County Cork in order to retain two three-seat constituencies with adjustment of the boundary between the two present Kerry constituencies as constituted, or else by the transfer of portion of the population of County Kerry to West Cork and the formation of a five-seat constituency in the remainder of the county.
Cork City constituency could be adjusted to remain as it is at present, a five-seat area, or it might be adjusted to form either a six-seat constituency or two three-seat constituencies involving the return of the portion of the borough which is at present in the County Cork constituency. The remainder of Cork County could conceivably retain the present 12-Deputy representation but this would involve a considerable amount of rearrangement and the necessity to transfer some of the population of County Cork to Kerry for election purposes. It would involve either the loss of a Deputy or the transfer of a further 4,000 or so of the population from the city area into a county constituency.
The adjustments that could be made to deal with the situation in the Dublin area, Dublin city, Dublin county and Dún Laoghaire/Rathdown are so numerous as to make it impracticable to mention them here but one thing is certain, that nobody, neither Deputies nor voters nor Party organisations would know where they stood for some considerable time.
I dealt with the possibilities that might arise with the return of portion of County Westmeath to Kildare. That could involve adjustment with South County Dublin or North County Dublin with possibly even an adjustment between Kildare and County Wicklow. All these solutions would involve problems in other constituencies and what I have read out is by no means a comprehensive list of what would have to be done. It is merely an indication of the type of mutilation and transfer of population from constituency to constituency that would have to be done in these cases and probably after each succeeding census in future unless the change we propose is made by the people. Otherwise, we must look forward to these continued changes in constituencies and not only in those in which the numbers of population per Deputy change significantly but also in the adjoining ones even where the population remains stable because of the chain reaction which is set up in having dealt with other areas.
Deputy T. O'Donnell said he was quite sure that if single-seat areas were set up in his present constituency, his supporters from the present constituency would still come to him with their problems. I wonder if they were being chopped and changed at five-yearly intervals, as Deputy Dunne and other Deputies have been urging, would they ever come to know who their Deputy was. If Deputy Dunne is right in his interpretation of the Constitution, this type of thing would have to happen now. I cannot say with any certainty whether he is right or wrong; I do not know. This has not been submitted to the courts and I think nobody else can say with certainty either. Neither Deputy Dunne nor I is a constitutional lawyer. Personally, I doubt if there is any such thing as a constitutional lawyer. There are some who will give opinions with greater assurance than others but they can go to court and then find others who will argue with equal assurance from the other point of view and the decision will eventually have to be made by whatever judge is dealing with the case.
It appears to me in deciding whether or not a revision of constituencies is required now by the Constitution, it would be just as well to toss a coin. One thing is clear and that is that no area either in town or country is safe from this type of frequent change in the future under the present judicial interpretation of the words in the Constitution. "Savage dismemberment" was how Deputy Treacy described it. It is clear that unless a change is made, people in areas adjoining other counties will find themselves moved about from constituency to constituency like shuttlecocks possibly every five years so that neither the people nor the public representatives will know where they are.
Anybody who has any experience of practical politics knows that when this type of thing happens the people in the affected areas feel frustrated and virtually disfranchised. If the proposed change is to take place at five yearly intervals instead of 12 which is the maximum period in the Constitution the position for the people, the Deputies and the Party organisations will become chaotic. I know it has been contended that this is really unimportant, that Deputies are elected to legislate and that the constituencies for which they are elected are irrelevant; that the people have no need to have any interest in the Deputy as an individual but merely in his policy and that Party organisations are of no concern. I have no hesitation in saying that this is a wrong view. I think a Deputy is entitled to have a reasonably stable constituency, not one that will be different in every election he contests. I think the people are entitled to know their representatives—not to have them transferred to another constituency within a short time of being elected.
I fully realise that a revision of constituencies does not legally take effect until after a dissolution of the Dáil, but it takes practical effect as soon as it is made, and this, of course, is the reason why Deputy Dunne has been displaying such indecent haste in trying to have a revision made within two years of the last general election. I feel that it is unfair to expect the electorate to keep themselves informed of the frequent continuous shifting of the boundaries of the constituencies which would be called for if Deputy Dunne's interpretation of the Constitution is correct. The people are entitled to know where they belong and I believe that party organisations are important also. I think it reasonable that political parties should have a stable system to work under. They are composed of voluntary workers and they are doing work of national importance and this chopping and changing is not really fair to them. There are other democracies in the world, and this kind of nonsense does not have to happen anywhere but here.
We believed, at any rate, that this kind of thing was undesirable in everybody's interest and in fact it can only be avoided by having a referendum, so that in the opinion of the Government, a referendum was required in the interests of the people and their representatives of all Parties.
I may say that what we are proposing is not by any means unusual. In fact, the deviation that we are proposing, the ratio of population to Deputy, as between one constituency and another, is very small compared with other countries. The Taoiseach mentioned that wider deviations were commonplace in Britain and Deputies opposite chose to interpret that as indicating that these deviations only apply as between constituencies in the Highlands of Scotland and constituencies in the London Metropolitan or other built-up areas. This is not so at all. In 1962, it can be shown that there were very large differences in the ratio of electors in constituencies in Scotland. In Aberdeen North, the electorate was 66,351, whereas in Caithness and Sutherland it was 26,716, so that there was 148 per cent more in one constituency in Scotland than in another. In England, in Billericay, Essex, the electorate was 78,328, whereas in Gates-head West, it was 42,643, so that there was an excess of 83 per cent in one of those constituencies over another. In Wales, in the constituency of Newport, the electorate was 71,342, whereas in Merionethshire it was 26,435, so that there was an excess of 169 per cent in one of those Welsh constituencies over the other. We are not proposing anything approaching this deviation and still it has been contended that what we are doing is in some way undemocratic.
It is fraudulent to argue that what is proposed is in any way a departure from the principle of one man, one vote. The Constitution in fact does not provide for this principle at present. On the contrary, representation is on the basis of population, which is a completely different thing. In some places, as Deputies know, the proportion of children to adults is greater than in others and the existence of institutions catering for children in certain areas can be a factor in securing greater voting power for the adults in the particular area. For instance, the census shows that in the combined areas of Dublin city, Dublin county, Dún Laoghaire and Cork city electors comprise approximately 56 per cent of the population while in the rest of the country electors are 61 per cent of the population. Therefore, on the present basis a vote in these built-up areas is almost 9 per cent more effective than in the rest of the country. The maximum deviation of 16? per cent which we are providing for will not, of course, operate everywhere so that the end result will be unlikely to do more than equate a rural vote over the whole of the country with an urban vote if in fact it even does that.
The disparity is even greater in some areas. For example, in West Galway, there are 58 electors per 100 population, while in Dublin North-West, there are only 51 electors per 100 population, so that in present circumstances a vote in Galway West is 17.6 per cent less valuable than in Dublin North-West. The proposal here in fact would not quite redress that position. Relating representation to population rather than to electors obviously breaches the principle of one man, one vote in favour of the built-up areas and that is what is provided for at present and that is the position that Deputies opposite are trying so hard to retain. The proposal that we have here will do little more than redress the balance in the areas in which it will be applied. It is clearly laid down that the proposed permitted deviation from the national average will apply only in the circumstances mentioned in the Bill, that is, only where the respecting of such things as administrative boundaries and geographical features require it.
There is no question whatever of inserting in the Constitution a provision, or anything approaching it, that all rural constituencies will have a lower average population per Deputy than urban ones. In fact, many rural constituencies will have a ratio of population to Deputy of the same order as urban areas. This deviation will apply only where it is necessary to avoid anomalies and inequitable situations such as those I have mentioned and indeed it is not sufficient to avoid them in all cases.
There is no need whatever for this attempt by the Opposition Parties to divide the country along the lines of rural areas versus urban areas. That is a fraudulent argument. It is completely unnecessary and a completely undesirable thing to do, and yet for selfish and ill-conceived reasons, the Opposition Parties are desperately trying to do this. All it will be possible to do if this proposed amendment to the Constitution is made is to avoid to a certain extent this senseless mutilation that is required by the present interpretation of the phrase "so far as it is practicable" in the Constitution. The proposal we are making is not by any means sufficient to avoid this kind of thing in all instances and the deviation from the national average which is proposed is much less than it is in most other countries. It will, of course, still be possible to challenge a revision of constituencies in the courts, as was done on a previous occasion. While it is true that in present circumstances, the immediate application of this provision would probably be not fully to maintain but partially to maintain the representation in the western areas, it will also "operate to save other areas from savage dismemberment." There is no question of ensuring that there will be no change in representation if the population in particular areas declines. This provision has nothing whatever to do with the maintenance of the present distribution of Deputies in the country. That will only be possible if our regional development plan and our policy of decentralisation is successful.
I would like to say something about the proposals in the other Bill, the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution Bill. Once again, in regard to this, we have this question raised of whether or not there is public demand for an amendment of our electoral system. As I said before, I do not know what means the public have of demanding something like this, except as members of political Parties. There is no certain way of knowing until the people themselves vote on it. I know certain small pressure groups can come together, make a lot of noise and demand certain things, but the fact of small vocal pressure groups demanding something does not necessarily mean that there is a public demand for it. The newspapers are sometimes described as "organs of public opinion." I do not know whether this means that they interpret public opinion or form public opinion, or whether it is a combination of both, but I think an examination of newspaper files will demonstrate that since the last general election, and long before there was any suggestion from the Government that anything might be done in this regard, there has been a considerable amount of newspaper speculation that there would be an amendment of the present electoral system.
It would not be an exaggeration to say that there seemed to be something amounting to an assumption since the last general election that something would be done to change the electoral system. This of course means that the people would be asked to amend the Constitution because the electoral system is specified in the Constitution and cannot be changed except by a referendum. This speculation arose largely because of the disedifying experience of the long recounts in the Longford-Westmeath and Dublin North-East constituencies in the last general election. It is fair to say that those long recounts raised a great many doubts in many people's minds of the suitability of the present system. That definitely showed up the complexity of election counts under the present system.
They also showed up the unreliability of the results, and as a result it is impossible for anyone to have faith in the returns in any constituency where the result was close. Some people have said that the system is not responsible for the discrepancies between the different counting of votes in those constituencies but that this was due to the human factor and that this would be there, regardless of the electoral system as long as votes have to be counted. Of course, it must be admitted that errors are possible under any system, but at the same time it must be quite clear that the complexity of a ballot paper marked with the figures 1 to 10 or 1 to 20 or more is bound to lead to excessive errors, particularly in the later stages of the count when the fatigue factor becomes relevant and when because some candidate may already be elected and some candidates may already be eliminated, the ballot paper requires to be examined closely to see whether it is a No. 2, 3, 9, 10, 13, 14 or possibly a higher number that is the relevant one in the particular stage of the count.
For many years people who are experienced in watching election counts have been convinced that many mistakes are made when they see votes dealt with in those later stages of the count being distributed into pigeon-holes as rapidly as they are in the first count. At this stage of the election, it is really necessary to study each ballot paper closely and individually before deciding where it is to go, because as I said, on one paper the relevant number may be No. 2 and on the next, may be No. 9 or No. 10. So, to be confident in the result of an election under proportional representation, the count should, in my opinion normally, without any recount at all, take the best part of a week with the returning officer's staff working at a more leisurely pace, in better conditions and for a shorter than normal working day rather than at the present when they are working under high pressure in trying conditions and/or excessively long hours.
The recounts in Longford-Westmeath and Dublin North East constituencies have fully established that it is practically impossible to have an accurate count in present circumstances. This is due to the fact that PR, even though the principle of proportionality on which it is supposed to be based is only partially adopted, is in fact an impractical system. Apart from this, the fact that at different stages of the count bundles of votes for transfer are taken at random means that in a close election it is purely a matter of luck as to who is elected. If a different bundle of votes had come to the returning officer's hand a different candidate might have been elected.
There is no way I can see of making the present system entirely accurate except by carrying the idea of proportionality to extreme and counting all the votes for every distribution of the surplus and working out how a transfer should be made, but that would be so farcical that the system would have to be abandoned straightaway if it were adopted. The only way of making it reasonably fair in a close count like this after the first count when it was obvious that only a few votes separated two candidates would be to start all over again, to put the ballot papers back into a sweepstake drum, mix them up and decide that the candidate who got the best out of three such efforts was the successful candidate. Under the present system where there is a close result, it would be just as equitable to draw the name out of a hat. What happened in those two constituencies in the last two elections could have happened in others.
It appears certain that recounts will become more common in future elections and the results will take weeks rather than days to produce. In fact, it seems clear to me that under the present system, with practically no facilities for the agents of the political Parties or the candidates to be even reasonably sure that the complicated papers are distributed properly it is impossible to have an accurate result. Proper facilities are necessary for the agents to see the ballot papers at every stage of the count. If the count is to be carried out in a reasonably responsible manner, then even a normal count, without any demand for a recount, should take days instead of the present rushed system. At present everything has to be taken completely on trust by the candidates, their agents and the returning officer.
The conditions in which the counting staff have to work, are appalling and the hours are such as to make mistakes not just likely but inevitable. They work in circumstances of strain which, I think, call for shorter than normal working hours rather than the excessively long hours they are working at present. Apart from anything else, it is clear that if the present system is to remain and if there is to be any confidence in the results, election counts must become much longer and, of course, much more expensive. There may be difficulties in getting competent staff for the much longer periods that will be inevitable in future and there will be difficulty also in arranging that there will be proper facilities for candidates' agents to satisfy themselves that mistakes are not made.
I think that all the speculation that developed since the last general election was one indication at least that there was a substantial body of opinion in favour of a change being made in the present electoral system. Apart from that, all through the period the informal Committee on the Constitution were meeting, the newspapers again were continuously speculating on this particular aspect of the Constitution, and while the report of the Committee indicates that other aspects of the Constitution were considered at the same time, it seems clear from the report that the question of the suitability or otherwise of the present electoral system did occupy a large part of the discussions. In the event, no recommendation was made but the report, as I said, did substantiate that this loomed large in the discussions.
If there was not an actual assumption by the general public that something would be done to rationalise the electoral system, it was clear that there was a substantial body of opinion that a change was desirable. At our Party Ard-Fheis a number of cumainn had resolutions down calling for a change to single seats and these resolutions were passed, if not unanimously, certainly virtually unanimously. It may be said that these resolutions were inspired by the comments in the press but the arguments put forward indicated a deep belief that the present system was undesirable from many points of view.
There were many references to the long counts in the constituencies of Longford-Westmeath and Dublin North East. In regard to the question of public opinion, I may say that I do not know of any body in the country that is more representative of a cross-section of the people as a whole than the Fianna Fáil Ard-Fheis.
