Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 4 Dec 1968

Vol. 237 No. 11

Electoral (Amendment) Bill, 1968: Second Stage (Resumed).

Question again proposed: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."

Mr. Meaney

Before the debate was adjourned I was discussing with some Members across the House statements about four-seat constituencies. We had Deputy Treacy who was very critical of the four-seat constituencies here in Dublin. There was a Labour Convention in Ennis last Sunday and the members there instructed their delegates to have an amendment moved here in the House that the constituency would be made a four-seater. They cannot be shouting for four-seaters in one place and not have them in another. It seems that the Opposition generally seem to shout "gerrymandering" without looking at the position one way or another. Many of them have not yet spoken; those who have are contradicting each other.

I would like to refer to my own county of Cork. At column 1266 of the Official Report of 27th November, 1968, Deputy Treacy said:

"A large portion of North Cork has been detached and is now being added to Mid-Cork. This proposal, too, is quite unnecessary and is designed solely on a selfish political basis to try and weaken Fine Gael and Labour in these two constituencies."

On the very same day, 27th November, 1968, at column 1276 we have Deputy Barrett, a Fine Gael Deputy from Cork saying:

"On the last occasion the constituencies were carved up—and plainly in a spirit of gerrymandering which had no regard whatsoever for a portion of the constituency which, whilst it was then in the county, always looked upon itself as part of Cork City constituency—the Minister and his Party proceeded to carve up the areas of Blackrock and Douglas in such a way that an area of the city, within a quarter of a mile of the City Hall, was shifted into a constituency which sprawled itself away down through County Cork and on to the borders of County Kerry."

You have Deputy Treacy stating that there is no need to change the constituency and Deputy Barrett stating there was no need to have Blackrock and Douglas added to the Mid-Cork constituency. Deputy Barrett was speaking about 1961. They are contradicting each other. When one comes to Blackrock and Douglas in 1961 it is well to remember that they were part of County Cork and that they were electing members to the Cork County Council. They were not in the city then. However, since then they have been taken into Cork city and they are now electing members of the corporation. It is only right that Blackrock and Douglas should form part of Cork city constituency or constituencies as the case may be.

We have the usual remarks here from people like Deputy Barrett who always bring it up one way or another about "sprawling itself away down to the borders of County Kerry". One would think that we people who live on the borders of County Kerry have a malignant disease and should be avoided.

Deputy Barrett also states at column 1277 of the Official Report of 27th November, 1968:

"They are fully aware that the Minister and his Party will have the most cynical disregard for their rights if their rights clash with the interests of the Fianna Fáil Party, because the reason Blackrock and Douglas were pushed out of Mid-Cork was because they were very notably Fine Gael in their sympathies and that disturbed the balance of Fianna Fáil's power in Cork City".

I would like to refer Deputy Barrett back to the general election of 1965. when Fine Gael had a candidate in the field from the Blackrock/Douglas area. In that election the quota was 8,000 odd and over 40,000 voters cast their votes. The Fine Gael candidate from that area polled 789 votes. This is the area which is supposed to be predominantly Fine Gael. Our candidates in the same area got close on 3,000 first preference votes. This is an inaccuracy which I would like to be put on record. Again, we were speaking about statements being accurate and I would like to go back to column 1276 of 27th November, 1968. Deputy Barrett said as regards the people of Blackrock and Douglas:

"If they wanted to find a TD they had to hie themselves off to the country, the nearest TD being at Bandon or in Macroom."

I think it is very unbecoming of Deputy Barrett or anybody else to cast a slur on a Deputy who lives close to me and is my good friend, Mrs. Eileen Desmond. It is bad form that she should be deliberately omitted. After all, she was elected as a Member of the Dáil in the general election of 1965. She headed the poll at that time. It is very strange that we have here a man who is regarded as a leading Fine Gael personality in a city of 120,000 population and that he does not know a Labour Deputy who resides within seven or eight miles of his home. He would probably go astray there. If he is in any difficulty I will be glad to show him around the area.

This morning we heard Deputy Burton and Deputy Collins, who spoke about mid-Cork. Deputy Collins was bemoaning the fact that the Béara peninsula was going in with County Kerry and was being halved. Everybody knew that County Kerry in itself had not enough population to maintain six Deputies and that, if they are to maintain six Deputies, population would have to be added from some other area. Senator FitzGerald said:

I would suggest adding the districts of Knocknagree, Cullen, Doonasheen, Derragh, Caherbarnagh and Coomlogan.

That was a different part of Cork but, on Senator FitzGerald's suggestion, we would actually have a parish halved. The Minister would be accused of gerrymandering if he did that in order to get three seats in South Kerry. It was obvious they were going to say he was gerrymandering for one reason or another.

As regards the area of mid-Cork I think it is properly described as a truly rural area. I am very glad it is a truly rural area. I hope I will be able to represent those people after the next general election. It is strange that when I went to West and South West Cork many people welcomed me though many of them were of a different political viewpoint. They stressed the importance of having their Deputy living in the constituency. They were not used to it because of the Fine Gael Deputy who had represented them for years. I should like to emphasise that it is only right that when a TD is elected he should live within his area as much as possible.

Deputy Seán Collins announced to all and sundry that he would be reelected in the next general election, that we in Fianna Fáil would not put him out. The only danger there lies within his own Party: there are a few young colts there fretting at the reins and he may have a problem keeping them down. However, that is his business, not ours.

From what Deputy James Tully said it appears that the Labour Party would like to see general elections occur on Sundays. I thoroughly disagree. Irish people generally, regardless of their religious persuasion, have always held that Sunday should be a free day, away from work or any political activity as regards polling, et cetera. Long may it remain that way. There was talk by the Opposition to the effect that it is the plain people of Ireland who will decide the next general election and that it was they who defeated the referendum—the ordinary man and woman. Do we not all know that Fine Gael represent the upper class, the conservative element, in the urban areas and that they have their eyes set on the 400 acre farms in the rural areas? Do we not also know that when there was a Coalition Government Labour, strange to say, came in and backed Fine Gael and that the ordinary man and woman got very little by way of social service improvement from the Labour Party who rowed in with the conservative Party?

I should like to say a few words in conclusion about Deputy Fitzpatrick's suggestion that this Bill should be known as a "Bolander." Deputy Boland is the Minister whose duty it was to introduce this Bill. He brought it in, he was qualified to bring it in. This Minister has true Republican blood in his veins—those who came before him were of that outlook. All I can say is that I wish him many years of success in a Fianna Fáil Cabinet. The Opposition have said it may not be long before there is a general election. The day may not be far away but we will meet them and beat them.

Mr. Donnellan

It is not my intention to speak for long. I should like to refer to a few remarks by Deputy Meaney. He referred to the people whom we in Fine Gael represent, and at one stage he said we are associated with people who own 400 acres of land or more. The constituency I have represented to date is probably the biggest in the country and I doubt if there is one individual in it who owns 400 acres.

Mr. Meaney

Are you not the Party of the 400 acre farmers?

Mr. Donnellan

I doubt if the Deputy knows either the policy of Fianna Fáil or of Fine Gael so there is no point in arguing with him. If the Deputy went to Cork and spoke there as he did here today and if every person in the constituency heard him he would not be long here.

Mr. Meaney

Are you not the Party of the 400 acre farmers? You cannot deny it.

Mr. Donnellan

It does not mean much to the man in the street whether he votes in a three-seat, a four-seat or a five-seat constituency. Only those who are well versed in politics know the difference between the three-seat, the four-seat and the five-seat constituency and there cannot be a complaint about how these constituencies have been drafted as far as the Minister's Party are concerned. The Minister for Local Government did an effective job, probably the most effective ever done, in the division of constituencies. I will refer firstly to what he did to my neighbouring county, Mayo. Traditionally, there were North Mayo and South Mayo and, as we all know, there have been two Fianna Fáil Ministers returned from South Mayo with two Fine Gael representatives also. Due to the fall in population in Mayo, it was not entitled any longer to four seats in each constituency. If they were reduced to three seats, there was a danger that one of the sitting Ministers would lose his seat. So what did they do? They drew a stroke from north to south of the county and ensured that the Minister for Justice was on one side of it and the Minister for Health on the other.

Geographically speaking, this is unfair. North Mayo should have been left as it was and given three seats and South Mayo should have been left as it was and given the same number of seats. If that had been done, however, one member of the Fianna Fáil Party, now a Cabinet Minister, would no longer be elected. The same occurred in Donegal which also had been split from east to west. Now it is being split from north to south.

In Dublin, the majority of the constituencies are four-seaters. In any of these constituencies, less than 50 per cent of the vote will ensure two out of four seats. If you had 60 per cent of the poll you could get three out of the four seats. As I have said, with 40 per cent of the votes you would be guaranteed two seats. Fianna Fáil's general idea in Dublin, where their popularity is probably at its lowest ever, is to get two seats, to give one to Labour and one to Fine Gael. I am sure the Minister had this idea in mind when he drew up the boundaries. He has told us that some of them are not finalised and I am sure that if Fianna Fáil cumainn point out to him that it would be more advantageous to have this bit out and that bit in he will agree.

In reference to the west again, 150,957 people have emigrated from that region during the last 40 years, 46,000 having gone during the last ten years. I would go into the counties in detail but I feel sure the Minister for Local Government knows exactly the number of people who have left each county. Galway has lost 7,213; Roscommon 7,400; Mayo 18,000; Leitrim 7,000 and Sligo 6,000. If those people could find a living in their own country I am sure they would have stayed but their emigration is due to the fact that we have had a Fianna Fáil Government in office for so long who have done very little for these people. That is the reason we have lost seats now.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I must point out to the Deputy that emigration is not within the scope of this Bill.

Mr. Donnellan

I appreciate the Leas-Cheann Comhairle's viewpoint but I was merely pointing out that the number of people who have left the west of Ireland would constitute approximately two more seats here in the Dáil and the reason we have lost two seats is, in all probability, because we have had a Fianna Fáil Government for so long.

The constituency which I hope to represent in future will now be known as North-East Galway. I must say I am sorry that the part of South Galway that formed part of East Galway has been taken away from me but I am sure that the people in that area who supported me in the past will support the Fine Gael Deputy for that area now and prospective Fine Gael candidates as well.

I would like also to welcome the people of West Roscommon into North-East Galway. It seems that the Minister for Education was not altogether happy with the people around the Cloonfad and Athleague districts because he no longer saw fit to keep them in that area. Of course, this takes trouble off his hands because these districts are within the Suck basin and for a long time past he has been promising them drainage. He has got that off his hands now and it will be the responsibility of those who represent North-East Galway in the future.

This is an example of what the Minister for Local Government would have done if PR had been abolished. It seems to me that the Minister had a commission or his own organisation working on this for a long time because these boundaries were drawn very quickly indeed. I was surprised at the very efficient manner in which the Minister introduced this Bill and the fact that he introduced it so quickly after the referendum. I am sure that, if PR had been abolished, he would have introduced another Bill setting out the single-seat constituencies. I dread to think what that would have been like considering the job he has done on those three-, four- and five-seaters— three-seaters where he has a chance of winning two and four-seaters where in all probability he will only get one.

I forecast that, as good as the job is that has been done by the Minister to gerrymander constituencies and to ensure maximum Fianna Fáil representation, this will backfire on the people who drew it up in the same way as their efforts to abolish PR backfired. I have no doubt it will backfire at the next general election. It might have been possible in the past to pull the wool over people's eyes but the people today are more awake than they ever were in the past. I know that at the next general election they will give you the answer they gave in the referendum and which you hope they will not give you.

Mr. Dowling

I would like to add my few points to this debate and to say that we are going through a constitutional exercise which has been described as vindictive gerrymandering and getting our own back on the people. The attacks that have been made by the Fine Gael Party and the Labour Party have been heard before. No matter what way the constituencies are revised, in the last analysis it is the people who will decide who will go and who will stay. We have no fears in relation to that particular problem. We will face up to our responsibilities now, just as we will in the future. It is about time the Opposition speakers, both Labour and Fine Gael, grew up and realised that it is the people who will decide; that the composition of this House cannot be decided in the House but only outside it. It is only people who are afraid of the decision of the electorate who are terrorised in the manner in which the Fine Gael and Labour Deputies seem to be terrorised here. When "the chips are down", the Irish people are an intelligent people. They have displayed this intelligence in elections over a long number of years. When it comes to deciding whether they should remain in employment or not, then they will decide whom to vote for—and they can only vote for one Party, Fianna Fáil.

I listened to the Fine Gael Deputy for Cavan describing the Minister's Bill in a certain type of way. I would say in relation to this particular Deputy that he is "Fitzpandering" to the weak-kneed politicians, trying to terrorise those unfortunate men into a situation where they will believe they will lose their seats as a result of the revision. There is no doubt drones must be frightened and terrorised. The lost years of inactivity must be staring them in the face. Now that the situation has caught up with them, I can understand that they should have this great feeling of fear they have displayed here during the course of this debate.

The Fine Gael Party should change their name to the Political Legal Adoption Society of Ireland and adopt the Labour Party. It would seem this is what they are trying to do. During the referendum campaign they were concerned about the future of the Labour Party. Now they are concerned about the future of the Deputies of the Labour Party. I am not so sure this particular "adoption society" is not endeavouring to get into its ranks the super socialists we hear so much from in the Labour Benches as they have done in the past with a number of other political organisations that came into the House. The efforts of Deputy Donegan and many others to attract the socialists over to the Fine Gael benches may succeed at some stage. At the moment both Parties are just putting up a front. The people do not know what is going on behind the scenes, that the "backroom boys" of both Parties are conniving and supporting one another in their campaign of terror and character assassination here in the House—the campaign that was carried on so forcibly during the referendum. Efforts have been made by many of the speakers here to carry this out. I want to sound a warning at this stage to the Front Bench of both Labour and Fine Gael. The next time I hear comments such as have been made in relation to honourable men on this side of the House I will read out, paragraph by paragraph, what these men stood for and their misdeeds, and they will go out of this House very sorry men. That is what is coming to those people who attacked honest men in the malicious manner they did in the not too distant past.

The area I am about to represent is one on which I will stake my claim. Ballyfermot is coming into my area and I welcome it with open arms. Some of the finest people in the country come from Ballyfermot and Inchicore. I do not shrink with terror like some others at a new place coming into my area. This is a very fine area and I gladly accept it. People who have done their work honestly have nothing to be afraid of. It is only the TDs who did not do their jobs well in the past and who now find their past is catching up with them who have something to be afraid of. They relied on the historical situation in the country and they are now having to meet the possibility of having a revised area. It is quite obvious from the terror we have seen in the eyes of the Opposition that those unfortunate men may well have a political breakdown as well as a mental breakdown before the next general election.

It is easy to pick those people out. You can pick out the happy ones and the unhappy ones and you can also pick out the drones. There are many of them in this House and they now have to do something at last. We heard very few complaints from this side of the House because, as I said before, we are quite sure that the people of this nation, when called on, will put their marks on the ballot paper and will do so in a responsible manner. In the Ballyfermot area I am going to represent I want to sound a note of warning for the socialist Santa Claus who is going to get his long beard singed in the very near future. We have heard his complaints on this Bill and on other Bills and I want to warn him that he will be answered quite definitely in the future. I am quite sure this Bill will go through in the very capable hands of a very capable Minister and I am quite sure the people will get value for their money from their representatives who will be elected by them.

I listened with some interest to Deputy Donnellan, a man with great imagination. He spoke about the four-seat constituencies and said that one would only need to get about 40 per cent of the votes to get two seats. We gave you the option of one seat for 51 per cent. Now you are claiming that we can get two seats with 40 per cent. You cannot have it both ways. We are prepared to face a situation in which you would have to get 51 per cent for one seat.

Mr. Donnellan

The Deputy is confusing the issue.

Mr. Dowling

I am not. The Deputy claims that the seats in Dublin are gerrymandered to give us two seats for 40 per cent.

Mr. Donnellan

Could the Deputy tell me why there were not four-seaters down the country?

Mr. Dowling

The Deputy said that we only require 40 per cent to get two seats but under the system which was rejected by the people we required 50 per cent in each area to get one seat but now you say we only want 40 per cent to get two seats.

Mr. Donnellan

The Deputy is confusing the issue now.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I do not like to interrupt this dialogue but Deputy Donnellan spoke and Deputy Dowling is in possession.

Mr. Dowling

The number of four-seaters in the country in 1961 was 12 and now it is only 14 so it is not a big difference. It is only 12 as against 14. If that was the system which was to obtain surely we would have all four-seaters but there is only an increase of two. However, I do not want to detain the House very long. I welcome the Bill and I am sure it will give satisfaction to the majority of the people.

I note, as a Dublin Deputy, the population explosion in the city has meant that we need further representatives. We cannot be held responsible either individually or collectively in this Party for that explosion as it is something which happens in a progressive city. As a result, there is bound to be this increase in representatives. We hope this trend will continue. No doubt people have been attracted to the city because of employment opportunities or other factors.

Mr. Donnellan

Or the fact that they would be represented by Deputy Dowling perhaps.

Mr. Dowling

That may be so. I trust when efforts are made to ensure that the population will be diverted to other sectors that it will not be opposed and that no cry will go up, such as we heard in recent times, when an effort was made to bring about development of industrial estates which would bring prosperity to particular areas. With the development of the industrial estate in Galway and the industrial estate at Shannon I hope there is not sabotage in the future as Shannon was sabotaged in the past.

Mr. G. Collins

What about the chassis business?

Mr. Dowling

That is something which the people of Dublin and especially Inchicore will never forgive them for. They will not forgive the Fine Gael Party or the Labour Party for that. The ghosts of the Labour Party are sitting in the front benches. There is not a Member present. That shows their interest in the Bill. They are like terrified men prowling the constituencies scratching out envelopes to send cards to their constituents. Some of them appeared in my new area from the socialist Santa Claus. He would want to dig much deeper into the bag next year or there will be nothing left. That is the Ballyfermot area which I have already mentioned. I took a small trip through the area the other day and noticed the desperate conditions in it. I will have to work hard next year or maybe the next two or three years to put this area on its feet. Nevertheless, I tackle it with great pride and on the understanding that the people there are good and honest people.

Mr. Donnellan

I have no doubt the Deputy will make a change in it in a short time.

Mr. Dowling

There is no doubt about it. I have already made suggestions in my brief appearance there and the Deputy will notice by the number of questions in the future that I will be seeking amenities for this large area which has very few services. While I am here I shall make every effort to obtain nothing but the best for the very fine people there. I now want to refer to the other area in my constituency, Inchicore, where the sabotage took place not so long ago in relation to the chassis works designed to employ 3,000 people.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy should not continue to discuss this matter as it is not relevant to the Bill under discussion.

Mr. Dowling

Had this taken place, there would be 3,000 more people in the area and I might not have had to take so many people in from outside. I am prepared to make that sacrifice in the interests of the community, to serve these people, although far removed from me. I regret that the industrial workers who should have been employed in Inchicore are not there now but I will do my part to rectify this situation and to see, if possible, that there will be quite a substantial number of people there by the end of my time as a representative for the area. I have already asked the Minister, in relation to this area, to speed up the services that would create more employment there and, therefore, swell still further the population of this prosperous and ever-expanding area.

There was mention made today of the Senator's alternative. At least, one thing can be said about the Senator: he gave this matter some consideration. It would seem from the comments of the rest of the Fine Gael Party that they neither heeded him nor gave him any assistance. The suggestions made by many Fine Gael speakers certainly did not coincide with the suggestion made by the Senator. Nevertheless, the Senator did give consideration to the matter and was prepared to put the facts on paper.

Once again, I want to compliment the Minister on the difficult job he has done. As Deputy Burke said earlier today, it is impossible to please everybody. The people who are most noticeably displeased are the drones and those who after years of inactivity are horrified that they may lose the little bit of leather that they sit on in this House, as I have no doubt they will when they go before the people in the very near future. The people are always conscious of the fact that while Fianna Fáil are in office they will be in employment.

Mr. Gilhawley

It was not my intention to intervene in this debate. I am quite satisfied with the area which I have got. I believe that any Deputy who has done his work properly for the people should not be afraid to enter the contest in any constituency that he is given. The last speaker mentioned Deputies who did not do their job. In this connection I can see a few of the heads opposite falling. The Fianna Fáil Deputies in the west of Ireland did nothing to try to arrest the tidal wave of emigration which has been going on in the west for at least a quarter of a century. A great deal has been said by Deputies on the opposite side of the House about the loss of Deputies which is about to take place in the west. It may be that we will lose two or three Deputies in the west of Ireland but let us look at the reason for this. The reason is not what happened in the referendum. The reason is the neglect by the Fianna Fáil administration down the years which allowed 44,000 people from the province of Connacht to emigrate in the past ten years.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I do not want to interrupt the Deputy but I would remind him that an economic debate would so widen the scope that the debate could not be contained within what is appropriate to the Bill.

Mr. Gilhawley

I was dealing with the reason why the people in the west voted "No" to the tolerance proposal.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Chair could not allow the discussion on the referendum to recommence at this stage.

Mr. Gilhawley

With due respect, I think this is pertinent to the discussion, that we would not lose two Deputies in the west of Ireland had that emigration been arrested. There would be 44,000 extra people in the west, which would give us at least two more Deputies. There appeared to be a ring of dissatisfaction in the voices of those who spoke of our losing two or three Deputies. That loss does not surprise me, having regard to the neglect of the west that has taken place over the years.

I regret very much the demise of Leitrim as a political entity in our national Parliament. I cannot understand why the name of Leitrim will no longer appear on the political scene. I see no reason why the constituency comprising the area I represent should not be called Sligo-Leitrim or why the constituency comprising part of Leitrim and Donegal should not be called Donegal-Leitrim or why the constituency comprising part of Leitrim and Roscommon should not be called Roscommon-Leitrim. It is noticeable that the constituency comprising part of Clare and Galway is to be called Clare-Galway. It is not very clear to me whether that is due to political figures having associations with Clare. If that is the reason, may I suggest that we had great national heroes in Leitrim also and, if that is the case, it would constitute an insult to Leitrim that gave us the great Seán MacDiarmada? I have had close associations with Leitrim all my life. For 25 years, before I became a Member of this House, when part of Leitrim was in my constituency, I worked there as a young man and I found the people of Leitrim to be the kindest and most generous that I have ever met. Leitrim got the rawest deal of any county. The people of Leitrim withstood the evictions of the notorious Lord Leitrim. The people there now are the descendants of those who were driven into the hillsides and had to live amid rocks and rushes. It is the memory of these people that has been insulted by the deletion of the name of Leitrim from the political map.

The question has been asked from the opposite side of the House, what was the alternative, what was the cure? When the proposal to change the constituencies was first mooted I forecast to many people in this House what would happen and the reasons why it would happen. The reasons were very plain to me. The entire rot in the division of the constituencies in the west of Ireland set in in Donegal. There were two three-seat constituencies in Donegal. In each constituency there were two Fianna Fáil Deputies and one Fine Gael Deputy. If Donegal were made a five-seater the Government were bound to lose a Deputy; they could not get four out of five, and it might have been a Minister who would have gone. I do not say that if we were in power we would not do the same, but I am pointing out that this is where all the trouble started.

If Donegal became a five-seater, there were a few thousand left who could have been pushed into Sligo-Leitrim. Sligo-Leitrim had exactly enough for four seats: Sligo, about 50,000, and Leitrim, about 30,000. As I said, Donegal had to retain these two three-seaters and this had to be done at the expense of mutilating Leitrim. Once that happened no other change could have been made except to put central Leitrim in with Sligo and the south in with Roscommon.

I should like to refer again to Leitrim disappearing off the map in the context of the Taoiseach's visit to Drumshanbo during the referendum campaign, when he bewailed the plight of County Leitrim, which, of course, is the most depressed county in Ireland. At the same time, he had in his pocket an £8 million contract for an industry in this country, and we know where he put it, in his own city of Cork. If he was in earnest, why did he not put that industry in Leitrim, whose condition he bemoaned so much? That industry would have arrested emigration and possibly emigrants would return to build up the population so that we could have an extra Deputy there.

If this Bill passes and if I am returned again, I should like to welcome the new area of Leitrim in with Sligo, that is Ballinamore and south of it, and I can assure them of my best attention in solving any of their little problems if and when asked to do so.

Mr. Coughlan

Anybody looking at this action by the Minister for Local Government does not have to go too far under the surface to see that this has been a deliberate, last-minute subterfuge adopted by the Minister in his disappointment and in trying to recover from what the people told him in no uncertain manner on 16th October last. He now finds himself like the drowning man who will grasp at any straw passing by on the surface of the tide in order to save himself and to ease his conscience in respect of what he tried to perpetrate through the referendum.

The people are not fools, and in his desperation he now comes along and as he himself and members of his own Cabinet have said, they will now start on the butchering operation. What he means or who he means to butcher, whether it is the land of Ireland or the people of Ireland, is a matter for conjecture. My view is that by this hasty action the Minister is seeking refuge and succour and trying to safeguard himself and the dying Party he represents.

Does the Minister think this will be an injection that will bring back again the Party which he represents on to the republican road we had not heard of for a long time until the representative from Donegal mentioned it some days ago and was publicly rebuked by his own Leader for the statement he made, in the presence of no less than two ambassadors to this country who were listening in the Distinguished Visitors' Gallery? If the Minister thinks that he can now introduce Kathleen Ní hUallacháin and break the shackles that have bound us to a foreign foe, that he can wave the republican flag which was buried and buried long ago by his Party, he has another guess coming.

In this last-minute effort to retrieve himself and his Party he is only going further into the mire and he will sink down and drag the Party with him in this exercise. Anybody with only half an eye on political affairs in the country today knows in his heart and soul that this effort by the Minister has not got anything like the support he thought he should get from within his own Party. We know that members of his own Party made him change his mind with regard to the butchering operation which he wanted to carry out and of which he is well capable.

I want to talk for a moment about my own constituency. We had a surplus in East Limerick and it was generally known and spoken of by the intelligentsia of the Minister's Party how the butchering was going to operate in Limerick. However, having assessed the position, his own members in desperation, and knowing exactly what would happen, made a last-minute effort and got him to change his mind and leave a particular electoral area and take over another to safeguard their own interest. That is common property. It applied in East Limerick. A similar situation existed in West Limerick. His own Deputies knew it and they fled like scalded cats to try to change his mind regarding the butchering operation he had in mind there. West Limerick was short of the quota undoubtedly; so was North Kerry and it was his intention to take some of West Limerick and land it into North Kerry across the river. The pressure groups got busy and the Minister had to pull down his flag and tack his sails and turn from North Kerry to South Kerry.

Now we come to the slaughter of the "Holy Innocents" in the Banner county of Clare who have stood by the Party for so long in their stupidity and we find that all that was needed in Clare to make a fourth seat was 3,000 votes. They knew they could only get two elected in Clare, the Minister for Labour, God help us, and some old throwback that they would bring in for good measure and so it was no advantage to the Party to bring in 3,000 people into Clare and make it a four-seat constituency. Somebody else would benefit but not themselves in the Minister's view. So he divided Clare from the Atlantic Ocean to the Shannon, took 15,000 votes from it and threw them into Galway to make a threeseater of this famous constituency of Clare-Galway to suit himself and his Party. He divided Clare from Lisdoonvarna across to Killaloe knowing very well that the Minister for Labour was snugly tucked in between Ennis and West Clare.

Then what would he do? Last Monday he had received advice from members of his own Party through the urban council of Ennis and Clare County Council that a protest was signed by members of his own Party dissociating themselves from his action in this butchering operation. That was passed at the Ennis Urban Council and the members of his Party who signed it were brought to a special meeting called and held in Ennis on Monday. The local Deputy was sent down to castigate the members of his own Party who signed the protest. They were hauled before the council meeting and chastisement was administered to them. They had to come into the council chamber and talk their way out of it as best they could and make excuses for their action in signing the protest.

This is what has happened as a result of the Minister's action and he cannot deny it. It is something we shall talk about as we did prior to the 16th October, something I hope the Minister will take cognisance of, if he can retain the memory of what the people of Clare and Limerick say about his action. The Clare constituency is now butchered in such a way that one mile from Ennis the people no longer vote for a Clare man. That is part of ClareGalway. But the Minister went further afield into County Roscommon and took a piece out of Roscommon to make up the constituency of Clare-Galway. If that is not butchering brought to the nth degree I am no mathematician. The people of Clare know why this was done and nobody better than the Minister for Labour but the people of Clare will give their answer in no uncertain terms.

Is there any justice, honesty or fair play in this action? The honest-minded Fianna Fáil supporter who thinks back to the 16th October will reflect again because they have all seen the double dealing which the Minister has brought to his task since he took over his Department. We in the Labour Party are not afraid to face the people at any time. We are always honest with them and we have taken the honest, longterm view on these matters. Whatever way the Minister tries to butcher—his own words — constituencies — whether he means the land or the people, I do not know; eventually it is the people— he will get the answer he deserves.

There are much greater issues to be resolved; there are bigger things in the destiny of the nation that we cannot have discussed. We cannot let the people of Ireland into the knowledge of what is taking place or what should be discussed but we are rushing into this as we rushed headlong into the referendum operation and there is no doubt in my mind about the outcome of this operation by the Minister for Local Government. Let us not leave this today without impressing on him that the result of his action will boomerang with the same velocity as did the result of the referendum on 16th of October.

Mr. G. Collins

Since the start of this discussion on the Electoral (Amendment) Bill I have been amazed at the inconsistency of the Opposition Benches. Indeed, one could say that the Opposition have been using cajolery and humbug to confuse and cloud up the issue. This will not pay any dividend. Their insincerity is obvious and it is plain to see that they have no regard whatsoever for the intelligence of the Irish people.

A Fine Gael spokesman, Deputy T. J. Fitzpatrick, when opening the discussion on this Bill on behalf of his Party certainly put up a very good show. He did his best despite the fact that he had very little to go on. He was, of course, very critical at the start of his speech that the Bill was not recommended by the Minister. This is not the first time this has happened. I believe that it happened in 1959 and also in 1961. He made what can now be expected of Fine Gael, a sly attack on the character of the Minister for Local Government because the same Minister who is now introducing this Bill was with us as Minister for Local Government when the referendum proposals were introduced.

These remarks and the approach of Deputy Fitzpatrick have well and truly been answered by speakers from this side of the House. Deputy Fitzpatrick is to be complimented on his valiant efforts to introduce the commission into this discussion because he got his point on record despite all the efforts of the Chair. He went on to accuse us of gerrymandering under this new Bill but I should like to refresh the mind of Deputy Fitzpatrick and all those who think like him that the same thing was said of us and would have been said of us if the straight vote had been accepted and if PR had been abolished. The main cry of the Opposition during the referendum campaign was that we would have wholesale gerrymandering and I suppose they are now trying the same approach under the present system, the system of PR.

This is a repetition also of their approach to the Electoral Bill of 1961. We know that the 1959 revision was virtually an agreed revision; boundaries were to be breached and there was to be fair representation for rural Ireland and the west. I understand that this approach was specifically endorsed by the then Leader of Fine Gael. Soon after the passing of the Bill, however, legal proceedings were instigated by the then Fine Gael Senator, Dr. John O'Donovan, acting through Fine Gael lawyers, to have this measure declared unconstitutional precisely because of its approach to rural representation.

We all know that the court held the 1959 Act to be unconstitutional and Dr. O'Donovan and his friends were, therefore, quite pleased with their work and, as a result, a revision of the constituencies had to take place in 1961. However, in 1961 the Bill was bitterly assailed by Fine Gael and their allies simply because the county boundaries were to be broken but when the opportunity was given to the people of doing away with the necessity of breaking county boundaries and of having single-seat constituencies, the Opposition raced up and down the country and made sure that the issues of the referendum were clouded from the people and, as a result, the Government's efforts in regard to these electoral reforms were not successful.

Part of the opposition to the 1961 Bill was based on the view that the Government should have moved an amendment to the Constitution but when the Government adopted this advice after the publication of the 1966 census they were assailed by the Opposition. The Opposition are on record as having jeered at the Government for trying to maintain county boundaries—boundaries that, I might add, were laid down as far back as the time of King John. They argued that the west of Ireland was overrepresented. When, as a result of the decision of the people, the Government introduced a new Bill which necessarily reduces representation in the west and breaches many county boundaries, there is an outcry from the same people who only a few months ago travelled up and down the country opposing the Third Amendment of the Constitution Bill which sought to preserve county boundaries and to give fair rural representation.

In an answer to a Parliamentary question put by me to the Minister for Local Government on 26th November, it can be seen that TDs in certain parts of the country will need to get as many as 13,220 votes while in Dublin North West, 10,520 votes would suffice. We can also see that 10,850 votes in South County Dublin will do the same work as 12,350 votes in North East Donegal or 13,240 votes in South West Donegal. When the opportunity of having fair representation for the west and for rural Ireland was given to the people it was not accepted although we all pay lip service to the fact that rural Ireland should be fairly represented, all, that is, excepting one Deputy of the Labour Party, Deputy Seán Dunne who is on record as maintaining that rural Ireland is overrepresented. Even under the present Bill he wants to cut rural representation down further.

These are some of the inconsistencies that have come to the surface during this discussion and there are others. As regards the Constituency Commission, such a proposal was put forward by the Government in 1959 as part of the proposed amendment of the Constitution put to the people at the time. Both Opposition Parties criticised it, particularly the provision that the decision of the commission would be altered by only a two-thirds majority of the Dáil. They held that this gave too much power to the commission, that the commission would be too strong altogether.

In the 1968 Bill the Government changed the form of the commission to meet these objections, in particular by providing for amendment of the commission's findings by a simple majority of the Dáil. The Opposition then attacked this because it gave too little power to the commission. I do not think it would be any harm to place on record that the very same Senator who moved an Opposition amendment in 1959 to change a two-thirds majority of the Dáil to a simple majority, moved an amendment in 1968 to change a simple majority to a two-thirds majority. Fine Gael, having opposed the Government's proposal to amend the Constitution to provide for a Constituency Commission, are now pressing for it although they must know that it is not possible without an amendment of the Constitution. The Constitution as it stands, very clearly gives to the Oireachtas itself the duty of revision of the constituencies. Any measure which sought to transfer that power elsewhere would be unconstitutional.

One could go on citing inconsistencies. The Opposition and members of the Labour Party, in particular a prime mover, called for an early general election. They know well that under the Constitution an election cannot be held until a revision of the constituencies is carried out. Yet they are carrying out a filibuster against this Bill. We had Deputy Treacy attacking the Government for their "indecent haste" in introducing the Bill. It must be conceded, however, that there are a number of constant factors underlying the Opposition approach. The most prominent of these facts is their unconcealed contempt for the intelligence of the people. In this they are very much mistaken. It is because of this attitude that they are almost permanently in opposition. A second factor is their contempt for the will of the people. They opposed the Constitution in 1937 and they opposed in particular those provisions which gave the people direct control over the organs of Government. They opposed the decision that the people be given an opportunity to amend the Constitution in a Bill this year and they are now advocating proposals which conflict with the people's decision.

We have many charges of gerrymandering, charges that this Bill was given to us as a result of the work of a large Party and that the Bill is introduced for the primary purpose of making sure that our Party, Fianna Fáil, will have enough seats after the next general election to form a Government. I do not think that I should go into the general election campaign or the formation of a Government on this basis. As a result of the next general election, which will be held between now and April, 1970, the people will make up their minds whether they want Fianna Fáil to remain on as their Government. If they do not want them, the decision will be theirs as to what sort of Government they will have.

This is not the time nor the place to go into this and I only mention it in passing. We have Opposition Deputies saying that county boundaries are being pushed here, there and everywhere. I honestly believe that I would be the best person to draw up this Bill, if I were to do it to satisfy myself. I believe every Deputy in this House would draw up a different Bill if he had to do it to satisfy himself. I believe there are few people who are completely and wholly satisfied with the revision of the constituencies. It would be completely, utterly and totally impossible to please everyone. I am not pleased with the advantage I get in my constituency in West Limerick. If gerrymandering were the interest there, I should like to explain that this is largely a strong Fine Gael area which was given to West Limerick. This is known to the local people. I see Deputy Clinton smiling there. He probably thought I was about to trip myself up. This area is 60 or 70 miles away from my own area of Abbeyfeale. It is as far away as the town of Roscrea is from Dublin. If that is gerrymandering, it is a nice one. If I were working in my own interest I would like to see West Kerry pushed into it. I have nothing behind me and what I have been given is 60 to 70 miles away.

I had to laugh here today when I heard Deputy M. Dockrell, a prominent member of Fine Gael, saying that he would have a job to get across the Liffey if he were to get part of another constituency. If he considers it a job to cross the Liffey I should like to see him in a rural area trying to travel 70 miles odd and after that getting up on the Galtee Mountains to visit constituents. I wish Deputy Dockrell every success and I hope he will not suffer any stress in getting across the River Liffey.

We had a lot of talk about the breaking of county boundaries by Deputy T.J. Fitzpatrick (Cavan) and other speakers. According to Deputy T.J. Fitzpatrick, over the last few weeks, county boundaries should not be interfered with or broken. I believe Deputy Fitzpatrick, as well as Deputies from the Labour Party, are anything but worried about the breaking of county boundaries. County boundaries are not sacred things and should be broken if necessary. We had another inconsistency in the Opposition Parties saying that the county boundaries should not be broken. They are contradicting themselves. We had Deputy T.J. Fitzpatrick saying on 28th May, 1968, and I quote from volume No. 235, column 145:

The Minister seems to think that county boundaries are sacred and that the counties and constituencies should coincide identically.

He goes on to say:

I do not think there is anything sacred about county boundaries. For example, for years back, we have had county managers managing two counties. We have had joint county managers in a number of counties. Practically every police district in this State consists of two counties joined together.

He says that a hospital now caters for three to four counties and that, therefore, there is nothing sacred about county boundaries.

If you listened to Deputy T.J. Fitzpatrick, as I did last week, you would think that he has now forgotten what he said. It is only fair, right and proper that he should be well and truly reminded of this. In volume 235 column No. 518 of the same date he says:

I find it difficult to believe that people have all that dislike to moving from one county to another.

He said this after I had spoken at the time and made the case that we should not have to shift from one county to another unless it was vitally necessary. Indeed, Deputy Fitzpatrick and other members of his Party were not alone in that. We have had members of the Labour Party saying the same thing.

Earlier today a member of our Party said it was on record that the Labour Party were not in favour of county boundaries and this member of my Party was severely "sat on" by Deputy Tully. I avail of this opportunity to quote from the Official Report, volume 233, column 1517, where Deputy Michael O'Leary of the Labour Party is reported as saying:

The Taoiseach, originally, and later, the Minister for Local Government, mentioned the great problems involved in changing county boundaries. Who introduced counties into this country? Is this the national Parliament of this country? As far as I know, counties are relics of feudalism. We owe loyalty to this country rather than to any county. We owe loyalties to cities such as Dublin, Belfast and Cork, and to the rural areas: we should not shed tears for county boundaries which were introduced, in the first place, by an English administration.

When this was mentioned earlier today it was denied by Deputy James Tully that a member of the Labour Party would say such a thing but here is the proof that it was said by a member of the Labour Party. When it was mentioned to Deputy James Tully, he said, in effect: "Do not mind Deputy O'Leary: he is only a city TD." Deputy James Tully, for his own personal reasons, may have classified Deputy Michael O'Leary as "only a city TD". Deputy O'Leary is a representative of part of the city of Dublin and, furthermore, he is a Corkman and it is not so very long ago since he came to live in Dublin.

Mr. Treacy

You do not merely disregard county boundaries. You have wiped Leitrim off the electoral map. There is a difference between breaching boundaries and wiping a county from the electoral map.

Mr. G. Collins

Deputy Treacy is on record as saying he is quite satisfied with his constituency even though county boundaries are broken there and part of his constituency is made up of an area in County Waterford. He said he headed the poll——

Mr. Treacy

It is no thanks to the Fianna Fáil administration who carved up my constituency at that time in the hope that they would do me damage.

Mr. G. Collins

I did not anticipate interruptions from Deputy Treacy——

Mr. Treacy

It is no thanks to the Fianna Fáil administration that I headed the poll there.

Mr. G. Collins

Deputy Kyne of Waterford is a member of the Labour Party and he was in the same position——

Mr. Treacy

The attempt to gerrymander boomeranged there.

Mr. G. Collins

Please. Keep quiet. I have never interrupted Deputy Treacy and I hope I never shall.

Mr. Treacy

Deputy Collins will do his best to give a completely different impression——

Mr. G. Collins

The truth is hard. The truth always hurts you because you are one of the people who were classified in one of my opening sentences——

Mr. Treacy

You are talking a lot of twaddle.

Mr. G. Collins

I am not talking out of turn. Tomorrow, when I would be expecting interruptions from the Deputy, I would say it. You have never denied that you were quite satisfied with your constituency.

Mr. Treacy

It backfired on you.

Mr. G. Collins

You cannot have it both ways. That is what is wrong with fellows like you. We shall not allow you to have it both ways. You are a pack of opportunists. You want it one way one day and a different way the next day. You will have to take it the same way the whole time. If you want county boundaries then stick to that: if you do not want county boundaries then forget the matter.

Mr. Treacy

Tell us about Leitrim now.

Mr. G. Collins

I will tell you something now that another member of your Party said a few minutes ago. Deputy Coughlan spoke of the revision of East and West Limerick and had a cock and bull story to tell. He said that great efforts were made to keep one little townland from being transferred into West Limerick. Deputy Coughlan must not be very familiar with the rural part of his constituency. It is plain to see, since the introduction of the Electoral Bill, that the area given to West Limerick from East Limerick was in a bottleneck and that five parishes were there. Even with an imagination as large as that of Deputy Treacy, one could not say——

Mr. Treacy

I suppose it was done to help Deputy Coughlan?

Mr. G. Collins

The day I would want help from you would be a long way off. If I wanted help, I would not go to Deputy Treacy.

Mr. Treacy

I am sure your desire was to help Deputy Coughlan in this instance.

Mr. G. Collins

I am sure I can get a lot of help from Deputy Fahey. Would Deputy Treacy and his colleagues please keep quiet and let me make my speech? I listened to the speech by Deputy P.J. Hogan of South Tipperary who is a respected surgeon and gentleman. He dissected the Bill. I have great respect for his medical dissections but I regret that I have not the same respect for his dissections of constituencies.

Mr. Treacy

No doubt you have great respect for Dr. Kevin Boland.

Mr. G. Collins

Deputy P.J. Hogan, who is a fine surgeon, had the shakes in his hand when he was using the scalpel on the constituencies.

Mr. Clinton

He is not a good butcher.

Mr. G. Collins

He cannot be regarded as a good surgeon where the creation of constituencies is concerned because the figures he gave were so glaringly out. When I checked them, they were not out by ten or fifty per cent nor by 100 per cent; in some cases, they were out by thousands per cent. Admittedly, he said he was not an expert at such figures and we let it go with him. He should be informed. His worthy colleague from South Tipperary, Deputy Fahey, cleared the air for him in no uncertain manner.

Deputy Coughlan alleged that East Limerick was fashioned in order to keep out a particular town. It was not named because the Deputy knew that what he said was completely untrue. It is typical of his approach to the debate. I have no doubt that the Minister for Local Government will deal with what he had to say as it deserves to be dealt with and as he was dealt with a couple of weeks ago when the Minister had the same type of job to do.

Deputy Coughlan also told us that there was gerrymandering in West Limerick and that we were afraid that part of West Limerick would be pushed into North Kerry. It is a pity Deputy Coughlan did not enlarge on that statement because I should love to take it up and to give him the information which he is so sadly lacking. It is typical of the half lies, half charges, half truths which they are all adept at putting across. I have no doubt but that, when this measure goes through and when people have had time to digest it properly, it will be seen that we made the best use of the material available to us, in the interests of the nation. There are no steam-rolling tactics. Nobody can say with any degree of honesty that we as a Party are trying to push through this measure as fast as possible. Up to now, we are offering speaker for speaker. I honestly think there are more speakers from the Opposition benches so far but I think there is very little in it, if anything. Maybe the edge might be somewhat with the Opposition.

One would be inclined to think that, with all the cries we are getting for a general election—cries which we know not to be genuine—there would be some co-operation in putting this measure through the House. Despite those cries which we hear, I am inclined to believe that something of a filibuster is going on. I believe every effort is being made to keep this debate open.

Mr. Treacy

Look at the crowded House here.

Mr. G. Collins

It might not be crowded but it is certainly plain to be seen by anybody who sits here long enough that there is no shortage of speakers. One does not have to have a crowd, I think, to have a filibuster. If we had nice timing and a nice placing of speakers we could certainly have that. Again, there is something else that strikes me. There has been all the outcry about gerrymandering and about what will happen, but Deputy Tom Fitzpatrick (Cavan) has told us that there is no fear whatever as far as Fine Gael are concerned. In volume 237 of the Official Report, at column 1243, Deputy Fitzpatrick gave us a definition of the word “gerrymander” taken from the Imperial Dictionary of the English Language, New Edition, Volume II:

To arrange the political divisions of a State so that, in an election, one Party may obtain an advantage over its opponent even though the latter may possess a majority of votes in the State.

If Opposition Deputies are not afraid that we will get a majority of the votes then the so-called gerrymander will not succeed. Indeed, Deputy Fitzpatrick is on record as saying that the Minister will not succeed in his objects. If that be the argument, then Deputy Fitzpatrick, speaking for the Fine Gael Party, and Deputy Treacy, speaking for the Labour Party, are talking a great deal of rubbish.

Mr. Clinton

I should like, first of all, to join with Deputy Collins, who has just sat down, in congratulating Deputy Tom Fitzpatrick on the able manner in which he dealt with this Bill and on the very clear way in which he pointed out the motives behind the Bill and its many defects and deficiencies. It is not often that we get compliments and congratulations from the other side of the House, but it is nice to hear them when they are paid.

Mr. G. Collins

That is not fair. It is not true.

Mr. Clinton

Deputy Collins also talked about filibustering. There is no doubt about it, if his speech was anything at all it was a first-class example of filibustering. I do not intend to say a great deal on this Bill. I certainly will not be accused of filibustering because, quite frankly, I do not think this Bill is worth debating. I believe the Minister has finally and definitely made up his mind that, no matter what arguments are put forward and no matter how convincing the evidence, he will not change a single line in the Bill.

This Bill is the outcome of many weeks and months of haggling within the Minister's own Party. It is a wellknown fact that the horse dealing was so intense that, in some cases, all the Fianna Fáil members of county councils had to come up here to try to settle the arguments. All the time the basic motive was how could they get the maximum number of Fianna Fáil TDs returned to this House. If any further evidence were needed of the arrogance towards, the disregard for and even contempt of the people, this Bill certainly provides it. The Government have wasted the best part of the last 12 months and an enormous amount of money in trying to provide themselves with the necessary machinery for gerrymandering on a large scale, but the people gave them their answer. When certain proposals were put before the people in the referendum they met with a crushing defeat. This is now a further effort at gerrymandering. It is a last ditch attempt to use the situation in which they are obliged to revise constituencies in order to gerrymander the country and ensure that the maximum possible number of Fianna Fáil TDs are elected. "The best laid schemes ... gang aft agley" and I have no doubt that the people will respond, when the opportunity offers, in the very same way as they did when the referendum proposals were before them.

Deputy Collins referred at length to the question of breaching boundaries. It is well known that the Minister for Local Government went all over the country, thumping his breast piously and solemnly because of the grievous sin it would be if natural boundaries had to be crossed or infringed in any way. He was denied what he was looking for in the referendum and he now comes back here with a job to be done. Had he tried to cut up the country and breach the greatest possible number of boundaries—natural, county and otherwise—he could not have done it better than he has done it in this Bill. He has separated no less than 17 pieces of nine counties, although it has been clearly shown, and it has not been denied by any member of the Fianna Fáil Party so far, that revision could have been done by altering only six pieces of six counties, and this without the expertise and the advice available to the Minister in his own Department.

I am not sufficiently familiar with the greater part of the country to criticise in detail, but there are a couple of areas with which I am familiar. I am certainly familiar with my own constituency of County Dublin. It is quite obvious to me what the intention is in County Dublin. There is little regard to natural boundaries. I am sorry the Minister is not here because I intend to spell out for him in some detail what has been done. Ballyfermot has been put in with the city. Now that is something with which I agree. It always belonged there, but it is no harm to point out that the Minister recognised that he himself had lost the support of the people of Ballyfermot; he recognised that very definitely on the day of the referendum. He recognised it previously in the Presidential Election. He used to have the support of the people of Ballyfermot but the people in Ballyfermot have wakened up to the fact that absolutely nothing has been done for them over the years and that theirs was a most neglected area. The Minister decided it was better to get that load off his back. He did not want any repetition of that humiliation in the coming general election.

The next motive uppermost in his mind was to get rid of me. He told me twice across the floor of the House that he would settle me. Possibly he may have succeeded, but I am quite happy to leave that to the verdict of the people. He divided my county council area exactly in two so that no matter which area I chose to stand in I would find myself with half the votes I normally get as a result of the work I have done over the years in my council area, where I have headed the poll on three different occasions in the local elections. I am confident that when this comes before the people they will give me the support they have always given me in the past.

His next motive was that he wanted to get away from Deputy P.J. Burke. Deputy Burke has always been a great embarrassment to the Minister. He has been an embarrassment because he has headed the poll consistently. He is a hard worker and the people know it in his constituency. They have recognised that over the years. The Minister thought it was as well to get away from him. I understand that the latest rumour at Fianna Fáil meetings is that the Minister is trying to get Deputy Burke to stand with him in South County Dublin. Could anything be a greater laugh?

That was not the end of his motives. His further motive was to ensure that Deputy Foley would be kept in this House. Deputy Foley is a favourite with the Minister and consequently he chopped up the constituency in such a way that two seats would be almost assured for Fianna Fáil in North County Dublin. I would not be as certain as the Minister is that those are two safe seats, because I believe the people have made up their minds. We have had a landslide recently, and it would not take a landslide to ensure that Fianna Fáil are not able to retain two seats in North County Dublin. However, that is the intention behind it.

I would ask the people to have a look at the shape of the new constituencies, to have a look at the shape of Dún Laoghaire/Rathdown, to have a look at the shape of South County Dublin, to have a look at the area that is now described as North County Dublin. Believe it or not Kimmage, Manor Estates and Greenhills are in North County Dublin which goes over to KCR Garage. Talk about natural boundaries. There were numerous natural boundaries which could have been followed but they were ignored. They were ignored for certain purposes, and I have enumerated some of the purposes. One was to eliminate a councillor of their own who was likely to be a rival and who is not a favourite, Councillor Walsh, and by splitting his council vote they ensured that he was killed off. When you live in a constituency and are intimate with what is happening in it you know the moves behind the scene.

The Minister was bound to be an expert in his own area. Why did he not take the Naas road as a boundary? Everyone knows it is a natural boundary. Why not take the road to the west or the Navan road? Those are natural boundaries. Why not take the Navan road and make North County Dublin a three seater and give South County Dublin four seats?

Mr. P. Brennan

The population comes into it.

Mr. Clinton

If he took the Navan road he would have the population for a three seater on the north side and a four seater on the south side. He has gone out of his way to change the boundaries. South County Dublin now crosses the Bray Road at one point. Is the Bray Road a natural boundary? Why chop in and out like that?

Mr. P. Brennan

I thought Deputy Cosgrave had that fixed up?

Mr. Clinton

If Deputy Cosgrave succeeded he succeeded in getting something sensible done. I am not sure he has succeeded. I would ask anyone with time to spare to have a look at the way they have cut in on the map. Look at Walkinstown, Greenhills and Manor Estates. See the shape of the map and ask what regard was had for natural boundaries. It is the greatest laugh and the greatest nonsense to say that any heed was paid to the natural boundaries. This is simply and solely a revenge Bill, a Bill to show the people that they have not succeeded in changing the Government's efforts to gerrymander the country and keep themselves in office for the next 20 years. This is a further blatant effort to do that.

I want to say a word now about County Meath. I said I know something about County Meath. Here Deputy Farrelly was uppermost in the Minister's mind. Deputy Farrelly lives at the furthest end of County Meath and, of course, the effort here is to get rid of him by putting his own home area in Monaghan. This is very important—the area where he is known best and where his vote is strongest. There has been a Fine Gael seat in Meath since the foundation of the State and a Fine Gael seat will remain in Meath no matter what effort the Minister makes. I think he can only succeed in giving us an extra seat in Monaghan and an extra seat in Cavan. As I said before: "The best laid schemes—". That is what the Minister deserves.

Knowing our own areas no one can understand why the country has been carved up in this way except that it was done for petty purposes and to show the people that they were wrong. It was obvious that Deputy G. Collins was not prepared to accept the verdict of the people. He says he believes they were completely wrong in the referendum and that this is a further opportunity for them to rectify their serious error in not enabling Fianna Fáil to provide themselves with machinery to gerrymander the country.

There is no point in speaking at length on this Bill because the Minister has finally and definitely made up his mind. There will be no change, and no argument will have any effect. We are being accused of delaying the prospect of getting this to the country. I will not be accused of delaying the prospect of getting it to the country because, so far as I am concerned, the sooner it goes to the country the better. I am confident that the people have made up their minds that Fianna Fáil are too long in office and that the most important thing at present is to change the Government. The country is being governed from the outside because of the pressures that have built up. The people have their minds made up and they will change the Government and, no matter what gerrymandering machinery they try to provide themselves with, they are gone. This change is inevitable and the Government may as well take it in their stride. Many of them are convinced that this will be useless.

Deputy Collins said that speakers in this debate had no regard for the intelligence of the Irish people. What regard had the Government Party for the intelligence of the Irish people when they put before them the proposal in the referendum? They had the same regard as they had for their intelligence in the proposal they are putting before them now in this Electoral Bill. I know that a job had to be done. The constituencies had to be revised. I spoke during the course of the referendum and indicated that this was vitally necessary because of the fact that in 1961 when the constituencies were being revised the position was that in County Dublin it took 9 per cent more population to elect a Deputy than it did in South Mayo, but in 1966 when the census came out this 9 per cent had grown to 72 per cent because of developments that had taken place in County Dublin. I say that the revision is essential and must be done. It provided the Minister with an opportunity to do a proper job. I do not know how anybody trying to rationalise the situation could come in from the Naas Road on the Long Mile and not take the small corporation area on the right hand side into County Dublin.

You meet the corporation area first and then the county and then the city. If we were doing anything rational, surely this should have been included in the plan? It is not included in the plan. Every natural and normal boundary in the country has been ignored. The Minister may say that he had to go by townlands? He may say this is the by townlands? He may say this is the only way we have because we must go according to population on the register. Townlands can go through the middle of fields. We have a position now here under this new arrangement in which people who voted all their lives in Newcastle, and who went to school in Newcastle and are beside Newcastle, will be obliged to vote in Lucan, because of this north-south boundary according to townlands.

Mr. P. Brennan

Does that not apply where you have any new boundary?

Mr. Clinton

Not at all. Why not try to work this out?

Mr. P. Brennan

They are complaining here about cutting up parishes.

Mr. Clinton

I personally would have no difficulty in meeting the requirements of the Constitution and sticking to boundaries which everybody knows and on which people are walking and travelling every day.

Mr. P. Brennan

You would have four in South County Dublin and three in North County Dublin?

Mr. Clinton

You could do it that way and use the Navan Road as a boundary. I say that the River Liffey is not a natural boundary because it goes into the fields. People do not travel on the Liffey unless they are in boats and very few are in boats. I think that the normal thing is to use main roads.

Mr. P. Brennan

Then you could divide a village.

Mr. Clinton

You could. There is no crime about that. Here you have a situation which you have always had between city and county, where the right-hand side of the road was in the county and the left-hand side in the city. This is something the people know well. It is very easily divided but there are very few people who know the exact boundaries of townlands.

Mr. P. Brennan

It is the only way we do know it.

Mr. Clinton

I submit there are very few people in the country who know the exact townland boundaries. People know the roads very well. This is the way this effort should be made. This is the only way you could have a rational break-up. It might present a little bit of difficulty here and there because of population and of the collection of the census. It is the only sensible way to do it. Anybody who would tell me there were no motives behind the way the Dublin County constituency, Dún Laoghaire-Rath-down and the city constituencies were broken up could not be believed. I would say it is quite a laugh. If it is an attack on the people's intelligence this is it. One has only to look at the map and see the way the job is done with the line going in and out to fulfil certain purposes and to separate certain personalities. I have spelled it out in fair detail and I do not propose to do anything more. I am not fully familiar with the situation so I cannot indicate in detail the motives that have moved the Minister in the various other parts of the country but I know what was behind his movements in Dublin. I can tell him that there is serious resentment on the part of many of the people in what is now described as North County Dublin because no stretch of imagination could put them into North County Dublin. It would take a mind like the Minister's to conceive it. I know the people will give them their answer in the next election.

Mrs. Desmond

In the first paragraph of the explanatory memorandum to this Bill it is stated that the purpose of the Bill is to revise Dáil constituencies in the light of the 1966 census. We all know that there is another purpose and that is to revise Dáil constituencies with a view to securing the greatest possible advantage for the Fianna Fáil Party. That has been repeated very often in this House. Most of the general arguments on the Bill have been repeated at this stage. As Deputy Clinton and other speakers have said, it seems frustrating and futile to deal with the arguments on this Bill. Unlike my Labour colleague, Deputy Coughlan, who referred to this measure as a hasty one, I believe that this measure was framed long before we went out on the referendum campaign. This measure was framed before the referendum. Perhaps, some little alterations were made in it by the members of the Fianna Fáil Party by leaving in townlands, but generally, I have every reason to believe that this measure was framed before the referendum was held on the 16th October. This was the fall back.

When the Minister talked about the consequences of the defeat for the Government on the 16th October he knew very well what he was talking about and what the next step would be. The only consideration that appears evident in the measure and in the alterations that have been made is that the constituency boundaries throughout the 26 Counties appear to be arranged having regard to the desirability of decreasing and eliminating as many Opposition Deputies as was possible. That was the purpose. Another purpose was to avoid so far as possible competition between Government members or Government Ministers. I think my colleague, when speaking here earlier this evening, made that point pretty clear. He spoke about Mid-Cork and said it was essentially a rural constituency and that he will be able to represent it. That is why Mid-Cork has been so framed—so that a Fianna Fáil man can represent it. But, if you will pardon me, that is not what is important. What is important in the framing of constituencies is that the needs of the people are met, not the needs of individual Fianna Fáil Members.

Deputy Meaney made the point I am trying to make on this Bill. It was framed long before we fought the referendum campaign and Deputy Meaney said he had toured the area which will form part of his new constituency. He did not say when, but we all know it was during the referendum campaign to collect "Yes" votes for the proposed changes and, ironically, in the area which is now added to his Mid-Cork constituency. He was also concerned that another Cork man, Deputy Barrett, when speaking last week, overlooked the fact that I lived only seven miles from Cork city. Deputy Barrett had been making the point that the people of two Cork suburbs, Douglas and Blackrock, had to travel to Bandon or Macroom, if they required to see a Deputy. I am sure Deputy Barrett did not intend to reflect on me.

The point I wish to make is that members of the Government Party did not overlook my presence when reframing the constituencies in County Cork, because quite a lot of the area in which there was Labour support was syphoned off and put into West Cork. Two considerations influenced the Government when reframing County Cork and any of us could have foreseen that. First, North-East Cork carries five seats, of which the Government Party have secured two. The referendum result made it abundantly clear that the Government would not secure in the immediate future, if ever again, more than two seats in that constituency, so the obvious thing to do was to reduce the number of seats and arrange the constituency so that they could secure two out of four seats.

If one is concerned with Party rather than with the good of the people whom it is intended to represent, this makes sense. There was also Government concern because there has been a growing swing to Labour in Cork as, indeed, in all our cities, and the way to combat that was to divide Cork city. Great play has been made of the fact that it is important to retain Cork as a completely urban area and this prompts me to ask why not apply that principle to Dublin, vis-à-vis County Dublin, to Limerick city and to other such areas? If it is logical to treat Cork in this way, does the same logic not apply to other cities? However, a similar decision has not been taken in respect of the other cities.

We have abundant evidence in County Cork that what was in mind was to make it as difficult as possible for Labour Members, and for Opposition Members generally, to secure reelection. Also in mind was the need to eliminate as far as possible competition between Government Members and to create competition between Opposition Deputies. No consideration was given to the matter of convenience —convenience of representation or the convenience of the people.

Surely some consideration might have been given to the idea of having constituencies based on existing health areas. In County Cork we have north, south and west health areas, but we have a situation as a result of this unfair, unjust alteration of constituencies, in which in Mid-Cork we represent three different health areas, in East Cork we represent two health areas and in South-West Cork we represent the same number. This makes representation difficult and it makes it difficult for the people. The only purpose it serves is to ensure that the maximum benefit will be derived by the Government Party. This is rampant in the entire proposals for the 26 Counties—one finds that the same picture obtains throughout.

That is why I agree with others who have said that it is futile to speak at length on this measure. It was framed for this purpose, it will be carried and put through the House despite anything we can say. That is what matters in the minds of the present Government. Two nights before the voting took place on the referendum, the Taoiseach appeared on television. He said he was horrified at the suggestion that gerrymandering could take place under the single seat system and he challenged the Leaders of the other two Parties to do any better than the Government had done in the reframing of constituencies. I do not think the situation has changed since—there is the difference between multi-seat and single seat constituencies—and I now challenge the Taoiseach to leave to a Committee of the House the job of reframing constituency boundaries. Of course, that challenge will not be met because, when the House had the chance of acceding to a request to set up a commission, the Taoiseach and his Party voted against the proposal.

As I have said, there is no point in continuing to speak on this. I realise I may not refer to questions which are not included in the Bill but perhaps I might be allowed to speak on something which I think should be in the Bill. I refer to postal votes for emigrants. This is not a novel idea. A great deal of concern is being expressed for rural Ireland. It was expressed by the Minister during the referendum campaign, it was expressed in his introductory statement and in Government speeches on this Bill. We have made provision for votes for Army personnel serving overseas. We should decide that our emigrants, particularly temporary emigrants, as we hope most of them will be, should be entitled to vote in elections while they are away from home.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I do not wish to interrupt the Deputy but within the framework of this Bill we deal with the constituencies only. The Deputy will appreciate that it is not an ordinary electoral Bill.

Mr. Clinton

The Deputy got it in. It was a very good performance.

Mrs. Desmond

I have nothing to add except to say that this is not a Bill based on the 1966 Census. It is a Bill designed to make the best of a bad job after the colossal defeat experienced by the Government in the recent referendum. This is a last desperate attempt by the Government to hold on to power, but I can assure them that when the next election comes along the people will decide that the Government who are capable of rushing a measure of this sort through the House will be defeated just as they were in the recent referendum—by a colossal margin.

Mr. Molloy

I rise to make a few very brief remarks. Maybe I can attribute the fact that I wish to make these remarks to the contribution of Deputy Mrs. Desmond, at least the latter part of it. She was referring to the idea of the constituencies being drawn up by a commission, to the Taoiseach's offer on television during the referendum campaign. She did not appear to state very clearly that he was making the offer to accept any type of commission in the setting up of single-seat constituencies. The idea of having single-seat constituencies has, of course, been rejected and we are to continue under PR. It came to my mind that throughout the referendum campaign the Opposition speakers time and again emphasised the point that the PR system that operated in this country suited the country, that it was an Irish PR system, that it was a system particular to this country, something which had been accepted by the Irish people, something which was understood by them.

Mr. Clinton

The system we have we know.

Mr. Molloy

Yes, that was more or less the line you were taking. If, however, we were to have an independent commission set up to draw up the constituencies under PR you would have a much different position because the Constitution only states that constituencies must have at least three seats. There is nothing in the Constitution to stop an independent commission from recommending to this House that we should have one constituency with 144 seats. There would not have been any necessity for them to pay any heed to what we were told was the Irish system of PR. We could have ended up with recommendations which would have been abhorred not alone by Members of this House but by the vast majority of the people. We could have ended up with a completely different electoral system, something we did not want at all. I just want to point out the many strange decisions which it would be possible to make by giving an independent commission power to draw up constituencies under PR. They could not have done this to any great degree under a single seat system.

During the referendum campaign charges of gerrymandering were being made. I was very much in favour of the single-seat constituency idea and of the straight vote because it would be the only proper way to operate single seats. We were being told— because it was good propaganda I suppose at the time to drag this into it—that we were seeking power with which we could gerrymander the constituencies. As we know the proposals in the referendum were defeated. The people who were making the charges that if they were passed there would be gerrymandering are still making the charge that there is gerrymandering. I suggest they just cannot have it both ways. The Irish people are intelligent and it is very foolish of political representatives to underestimate the intelligence of the people. I feel that it is a deliberate insult to the intelligence of the Irish people to suggest to them not to vote for something because it would give power to gerrymander and then when they do not vote for it, to still come in and make charges that gerrymandering is being carried out. It is not logical and I suggest to them that they are wasting their time with those allegations.

Nobody expects the Fine Gael or Labour Party to come into the House and tell the Minister for Local Government that they agree with his proposals for the drawing up of the constituencies in their entirety. He did not wish it upon himself to have to draw up new constituencies. He has to do this because of the position under the Constitution. Everybody understands this. The revision was thrust upon him and he had to do the job. It is not reasonable to expect that the Opposition Parties would agree with him, but to continue to make charges of gerrymandering just does not make sense to me because no matter what proposals he brought in they would still be opposing them.

There are 144 Members in the House. Slightly over half of them are on the Government side of the House and very few of the Government Members are satisfied with these proposals either because nearly every Member of the House has had his original constituency, in which he was elected, interfered with. They had to be changed to meet the new requirements. Even in my own constituency in the west of Ireland which was a three-seat constituency and still is a three-seat constituency under the new proposals we have had a change, a small change. I am not happy about it, but I have to accept it.

We have lost a portion of the West Galway Constituency and, when one has worked as well as one can for people in an area and then finds that they will not be in a position to vote for him at the next election, naturally one is rather sad about it and feels slightly upset. But that is political life and I am afraid it is something we will have to put up with. I hope that the people whom I represented in the Liscannane electoral district will be happy in their new constituency. However, that is only a very small change. Some of the Deputies on the Fianna Fáil side of the House will find themselves in completely new areas and to a large extent will find themselves in a very difficult position as regards going to new people asking them to vote for them. This affects both sides and all Parties and it just is not good enough for members of the Fine Gael Party and the Labour Party to say that they are the only people who have cause to be upset. In the corridors of this House the Fine Gael and Labour Members know from speaking privately to Fianna Fáil TDs that very many of them are upset and unhappy about the new situation—not, indeed, that they fear it but it is natural to be upset about having to stand in a different area from the one in which one has probably stood for many years and where one has come to know a large section of the electorate and has worked with them and lived with them. For a large proportion of those people it will be quite a change.

Therefore, I appeal for a little bit of fair play from Fine Gael and Labour. It seems to me that the great desire on their part is to throw as much mud as they can, to say as many things, horrible things, as they can possibly think of. There is a tremendous amount of rumour-mongering emanating from the Opposition Benches and every time that it is challenged there is no evidence produced to substantiate the allegations being made. I congratulate and compliment Deputy Cosgrave on the appeal which he has made——

Mr. Farrelly

On a point of order, is this relevant?

Mr. Molloy

——to his own members to stop this kind of carry-on. I wish to associate myself with the remarks of Deputy Cosgrave. He was speaking to his own people and I only hope they will listen to him on this occasion because they did not listen to him when he asked them to vote for the Government proposals in the referendum.

Mr. Farrelly

That was enlightened advice from Deputy Molloy. Having listened to some of the debate on the Electoral (Amendment) Bill, it surprised me to hear Deputy Molloy turn away from the purpose of the debate this afternoon to give advice to the members of the Fine Gael Party. I do not think the members of the Fine Gael Party need any advice from Deputy Molloy or any other Deputy as to how they should behave.

I have just one or two things to say on this Bill and I do not think there is any Deputy in this House who should have more to say about it than I have. I am not going to say very much this evening as I will have more to say on it during the later Stages. I happen to be a Deputy who has had two-thirds of the electoral area he represents on the county council taken away from him and one-third of the adjoining electoral area also taken away. All those areas are within 12 to 14 miles from me. Actually, the parish in which I live has been divided. One portion has been put into Cavan and the other into Monaghan.

Of course, when one thinks about Monaghan it immediately brings to mind the purpose of the whole act. We have now in the constituency of Monaghan an eminent Minister of the Fianna Fáil Party. He has gone around most of the constituencies in this country during his lifetime. From 1938 to 1948 he was a Deputy for Athlone-Longford and from 1948 to 1961 he was a Deputy for Longford-Westmeath. From 1961 until the present day he has been a Deputy for Monaghan. Cavan and Monaghan could have been made a five-seat constituency. That was in the ordinary scheme of things but with this eminent Minister going around from one constituency to another he could not be left in that invidious position so they had to give him a portion of county Meath so that he could arrive back in Dáil Éireann after the next general election as a representative for Monaghan.

Mr. L'Estrange

He might go back to Longford.

Mr. Farrelly

He might do so or go to Longford-Westmeath as it was. As I said earlier, I am one of the victims of what the Minister and the Fianna Fáil Party are doing. I am proud to have represented the people of County Meath since 1961. It is the royal County. We have been kicked around in changes of constituencies since the late 1930s. We were thrown at one stage into Meath-Westmeath. We had a sojourn there for a while and then we were taken back into County Meath and remained as one unit during the 1940s until 1959-60 when the last redrafting of constituencies came around.

In 1960 they proceeded to dole out portion of County Meath to Kildare and that is the way it has remained until the present day. Now, as I said before, to help this particular gentleman who is now a representative from Monaghan they had to take two portions of County Meath and they extended the constituency of Meath up to the Bog of Allen. I do not think anybody who heard the speeches made by members of the Fianna Fáil Government during the referendum to the effect that if you wanted your TD you did not want to have to travel long distances to see him can agree that if the Minister for Local Government wanted to find the TD from Navan or within five miles of Ardee that he should have to go to the Bog of Allen to find him. I do not think this is right and I do not believe the Minister for Local Government thinks it is right.

Mr. Boland

We agree on that at any rate. It is your fault not mine.

Mr. Farrelly

This has been done in the hope that they would keep a Fine Gael representative from County Meath out of Leinster House. Since the foundation of the State there have been Fine Gael representatives in County Meath and I have no doubt that when the next election comes around and the chips are down the people of County Meath will return a Fine Gael Deputy to this House despite what Fianna Fáil may think they have been doing to try to disfranchise the people who support Fine Gael.

In the 1960 rearrangement the Deputy for Fine Gael in County Meath was the late Captain Giles, God rest him. At that time, in order to see if they could take away Fine Gael support from the county they took his portion of the constituency away. He was not in very good health at that time and he decided not to go forward again. I stood for election and was elected. It is a very strange thing and looks very strange to me and the people in County Meath that I represent that they have followed me to the north of County Meath and have taken away the area I live in. I shall have more to say on this during the later Stages of the Bill but when the chips are down the people of County Meath will thwart the efforts of the Fianna Fáil Party who are trying to deny Fine Gael their true representation in County Meath.

Mr. L'Estrange

I believe that this Bill is a vindictive act, a vindictive Bill brought in by a vindictive Minister against the people who dared express their opinions in a massive vote against the Government recently in the referendum. The Government stand condemned and discredited. Because they know that have lost the support of the majority of the people they are trying in this Bill to hold on to the reins of office.

We have in this Bill a form of gerrymandering equal to, if not worse than, that which the Unionists have perpetrated on the people of Derry. We have heard Fianna Fáil speak about their aspirations for a long number of years. We have heard them tell us they would get back the Six Counties. For a long number of years we had 26 Counties but now one county in the west, lovely Leitrim, is being wiped completely off the map. The Government try to blame the Opposition Deputies. The Minister has done so day after day and said across to the people on this side of the House: "You and you alone are responsible for this." I want to say that the people are responsible for what is happening.

I heard Deputy Molloy speak a few moments ago about the intelligence of the people. The people are certainly intelligent because over 600,000 of them have shown how intelligent they were recently when they showed they were not prepared to allow the Government to rivet themselves in power by the first proposition that was put to them. Because that was defeated by an intelligent electorate, they now come with this proposition to the House. If marks were to be given for gerrymandering, the Government would get 100 per cent. Deputy Briscoe may smile. Consider how the constituencies are framed, the manner in which the Government have crossed county borders where and when it suited them.

Senator FitzGerald pointed out in the daily national newspapers that if a body of people wanted to arrange the constituencies in a fair and honest way, cherishing all the children of the nation equally—a sentiment to which Fianna Fáil give so much lip service —they could have done it by crossing only six county borders and disturbing approximately 35,000 to 36,000 of the population. Here we have a proposal to cross 13 borders and to disturb well over 100,000 people.

Mr. Briscoe

Like all your figures, unsubstantiated.

Mr. L'Estrange

The Deputy is the last one who should speak about it. If, for example, the Government wanted to cherish all the children of the nation equally, if they wanted to be fair to the minority, they could have left Cavan and Monaghan as a five-seat constituency and could have left Donegal as a five-seat constituency but the grass roots came out and said, "If you do, the Protestant Association will get a seat in each area and we cannot trust them to walk into the division lobby with Fianna Fáil". They did not want that. When you talk about cherishing all the children of the nation equally, they should have given those people their God-given right. They are the people who speak so much about the rights of the minority. The minorities should remember that. It is well known that people from Donegal, Monaghan and Cavan came up and asked them not to leave Donegal as a five-seat constituency, that the protestant Association would get a man in there and that they could not trust him, that they did not know what way he would vote. The same happened as regards Monaghan. It is obvious from the map that it would be quite easy to leave Cavan and Monaghan as a five-seat constituency. It had the right number of people for a five-seat constituency. A smaller number of Donegal people could be moved into Limerick— I mean Leitrim—and if that were done Leitrim would still be on the map. The Minister need not smile because I said "Limerick" instead of Leitrim. When I mentioned Limerick I might not have been so far out. You brought portion of the constituency——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy must address the Chair.

Mr. L'Estrange

Through the Chair, to the Minister.

Mr. Boland

The Chair was smiling also.

Mr. L'Estrange

Portion of Clare has been added to Galway and to make up that constituency they have brought in portion of Roscommon. So that it would not be stretching the imagination too far to suggest that the Minister could quite easily have done what I, through a slip of the tongue, suggested. Their plan was quite simple. Where Fianna Fáil think that they are reasonably strong and could get 45 or 46 per cent of the votes, they have made the constituencies three-seaters, hoping that by doing so they may get two out of every three seats.

In the recent referendum they got the highest percentage of the votes they received in the entire country in Connacht and Ulster—45.2 per cent. It may be no harm to remind them that that represents a drop from the 54.8 per cent that they got in the same area in the 1959 referendum. Their desire now is quite simple. They think that in those areas in Connacht and Ulster they will get two out of three seats in the three-seat constituencies.

Now let us come to Dublin where in the recent referendum the Government got only 30.6 per cent of the votes. They are hoping that through some miracle they may get two out of the four seats. The people of Ireland have found them out as they have shown by their intelligent vote in the recent referendum. It is well known that the Government are flying against the wishes of the people as expressed by the massive number of votes cast against their proposals in the referendum. The people showed that they want to retain proportional representation. If the Government were to concede the wishes of the people, there should be five, six or even seven-seat constituencies. The Government believe that by having the larger constituencies they would lose heavily. Despite what the Government have done in this Bill they will be defeated because the Irish people have found them out and know them for what they are.

The Minister and many other Members of the Fianna Fáil Party were shedding crocodile tears because the west was to lose four seats which were to be added to the representation of the city of Dublin. As one who comes from rural Ireland it is my opinion that it is people, not mountains, hills or rivers, who are entitled to seats. If the west loses four seats, who is responsible for that? The responsibility and the blame rests on the shoulders of the people on the far side of the House and the Government now in power. Representation is based on the population of a particular constituency on a particular day in 1966.

Through Fianna Fáil's bad government, as a result of their neglect of the west and of rural Ireland, they have driven from the west over 150,957 persons, with the result that in Connacht there were 150,000 fewer persons on the register in 1966 as compared with 1956. That is the reason why there will be four fewer Deputies in the west under this Bill. It is because of the mismanagement of the Minister for Local Government and the Government of which he is a member. When the Minister sheds crocodile tears about crossing boundaries who but himself is to blame? The Minister often comes in here and talks about the dreadful year that 1956 was. We hear this regularly from the Fianna Fáil Party. In County Galway, since 1956——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I must interrupt the Deputy to point out that he cannot embark on what might be regarded as an economic debate on this Bill. We are confined, within the terms of the Bill, to what is in the Bill—the rearrangement of constituencies.

Mr. L'Estrange

I have not very much to say on the Bill but I do want to say that the Bill is deliberately framed to suit the members of Fianna Fáil. No matter what they may say in this House it is a well-known fact that there were two or three Party meetings held and that the squabbling went on in the Party Rooms at the meeting.

Mr. Briscoe

That is another deliberate untruth.

Mr. L'Estrange

Deputy Briscoe may shake his head, but it is a well-known fact that over a month ago the Minister had the Bill prepared, that there was a proposition, which was carried, at the Fianna Fáil Party meeting, that Deputy Boland's Bill would be put before the Fianna Fáil Party meeting for consideration. The Bill was put before the Fianna Fáil Party for consideration, and therefore you have the constituencies——

Mr. Briscoe

On a point of order. Is it in order for Deputy L'Estrange to make allegations which are absolutely untrue and cannot be substantiated? I know these allegations are not true, and I think there must be some sort of restriction.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Chair cannot control allegations of this kind which are in the nature of political charges.

Mr. L'Estrange

What I have said is quite true. I made a similar allegation before when the referendum was being discussed. We were told the decision was unanimous at a Fianna Fáil meeting. I stated here it was not. It has since been admitted by Fianna Fáil Ministers that it was not, and it was admitted by Deputy Lionel Booth, who proposed an amendment in this House, despite the fact that the Minister for Local Government said here it was a unanimous decision of the Party without anybody dissenting from it.

This Bill is designed so that the maximum number of Fianna Fáil Deputies can be returned to this House and so that the Fianna Fáil Party can try to rivet itself in power despite the wishes of the people. The Bill was deliberately framed to put out of this House at least three or four of our Deputies. For example, in the constituency of Roscommon they came within one mile of where Deputy Joan Burke is living, taking away 45 or 46 of her best polling booths. Something similar has happened in the constituencies of Deputy P.J. Reynolds and Deputy Philip Burton. We know what has happened in County Meath, the constituency of Deputy Denis Farrelly: they took part of Meath and put it into Cavan; they took another part of the constituency where he is living and put it into Monaghan, and at the other end they added part of the constituency of Kildare to Meath. As regards my own constituency of Longford-Westmeath, we welcome back the part which was taken from us by the Government in 1960, but we deprecate what they have done in dividing the town of Athlone and transferring 4,000 of the population there, more than 2,000 votes, to bolster up the position of the Minister for Education, Deputy Brian Lenihan.

The Government's gerrymandering tactics will misfire and will boomerang on them. An intelligent electorate has found them out, and while they suffered a massive defeat amounting to more than 234,000 votes in the referendum, it is nothing to what they will suffer in the next general election, come when it may. We are ready and all we want Fianna Fáil to do is name the day. Despite the fact that their Ministers have gerrymandered the constituencies to suit their own purposes, the Irish people love fairplay and justice. They hate injustice and will certainly teach Deputy Boland, the Minister for Local Government, and his Government a lesson when the next election comes.

Mr. Connor

Listening to Deputy L'Estrange one would imagine that nobody suffered through this rearrangement but the Fine Gael people. It is unfortunate that Deputy L'Estrange and his Party did not support the section of the referendum that would have maintained the existing constituency boundaries. They were completely against this and the result is the situation in which we find ourselves today.

I think I have the greatest grievance of any of the Deputies in this House inasmuch as, taking the area from one end of my constituency to the other, I have a distance of 113 miles to travel, that is, going from Ballydavid on the Dingle Peninsula down to Dursey Island in West Cork. This is equal to the distance from Dingle to Clonmel or from Killorglin, my own town, to Roscrea. This is an intolerable position in which to find oneself. No matter what Deputies on the far side say, we have plenty of grievances on this side of the House. I would, even at this stage, appeal to the Minister to ease this burden that has been imposed on us. Certain sections of my constituency have been taken from me, and if the Minister were trying to gerrymander at all, there are plenty of good territories in the north-east part of South Kerry that could have been dealt with, but the Minister did not do that. Speaking from my own knowledge I can say that our voting potential in South Kerry is no less than it was before the constituency was rearranged.

Something should be done in the future to see that people get the service to which they are entitled. We have already very extended lines in Kerry, and it is difficult to get to the people even once a year. I try to visit all areas at least once and that is not sufficient if a Deputy is to deal with the many problems that arise in his constituency. At some future date all Parties in the House should get together and try to alter this impossible situation which has been brought about as a result of a High Court decision. I am referring to my own constituency, but I am sure there are many others, particularly in the western areas, that are in the same position. The people are entitled to a far better service than we can give them. Some of the people in those western areas are not very well able to put their cases in writing and have to depend on others to do it. I have to get to towns and villages and the various crossroads at least every two months in order to meet the people who are looking for my assistance, and it is an impossible strain for a Deputy to give the service that is needed.

If the Opposition Deputies are honest in their approach to the referendum result, they must face up to the problems that have been created. The proposal was put before the people to adjust the constituencies or at least to bring the tolerance into effect. This is a position which should have been made clear. It is an aftermath of the whole thing that now remains and makes things very difficult. People require greater service today than when I first came to the Dáil which is not many years ago. They seem to demand more; they follow Deputies around to get necessary advice. They are leaning more and more on Deputies. I hope at some future date, not too far away, something will be done to have the constituencies once more adjusted. It should be possible to reach some agreement with all sides of the House to have this brought about. Otherwise, the people cannot get the services they require. We find we have a further 15 miles added to the length of our constituency. This should never have happened. That is the position now and it certainly gives us plenty of work and headaches for the future.

Mr. Lyons

I suppose everything that could be said by both sides has been said on this Bill. Deputy Connor was very frank when he said that not everybody in Fianna Fáil was satisfied with the Bill. The Fianna Fáil people who attempted to apologise for the Bill and give reasons why it was introduced have had their say. People on this side of the House have accused them of ulterior motives but the fact remains, as Deputy Connor said, that this measure has changed constituency boundaries to the detriment of Deputies on either side. In my own constituency of Mayo the gerrymander, as I shall call it, has meant that my end of the constituency has been so changed that I shall have more difficulty in being elected than I had previously. From the Fianna Fáil point of view that may be very sound because I believe Fianna Fáil, and the Minister for Local Government in particular, so designed the two constituencies in Mayo as to ensure as far as possible that they would gain two seats out of three in each constituency.

The Minister carried out this division with that in mind. I am sure he had the advice of his two Ministers in the constituency and I know that from the Fianna Fáil point of view he probably felt it would be better to have the Miniters divided there. They were in the same constituency, the one I have the honour to represent. The Minister for Local Government did not do that in the interests of Fine Gael and possibly could not be expected to do it, but the way in which it was done ensures that another Deputy elected with me has been given more votes than he needs with the intention, of course, of lowering the Fine Gael vote in the other constituency. In fact, it is done to ensure that while a Deputy of my Party in one constituency would have a quota and a half a Deputy in another constituency, deprived of that halfquota might not be elected.

Perhaps that is good practical politics. Some Fianna Fáil speakers have said that if Fine Gael had accepted the referendum measure this would not have occurred. I opposed the measure even though I come from the west and I was accused by Fianna Fáil speakers on every platform of neglecting the west by so doing. It was said that by taking the action I took and making the speeches I made I was depriving the west of representation in Dáil Éireann to which they were entitled. I wanted representation for the west— there is no Deputy of any Party who does not want it—but I feared that the Bill was misleading, fraudulent and dangerous. My reason for saying that is that the Bill enabled any Government that might be in power—perhaps Fianna Fáil had no intention of using the powers they gained through the Bill—to arrange constituencies in such a way that one-sixth above or below the designated number of 20,000 would enable them to put an individual candidate into a seat. That is a power I would not like to give to my own Party or any other.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The issues in regard to the referendum have been disposed of and we cannot go back on the referendum.

Mr. Lyons

I do not want to go outside the rules of order and I bow to the ruling of the Chair, but the referendum and everything connected with it is relevant to this Bill because the Bill is a result of the referendum and the action taken by the people. The fact that the people took certain action and decided not to accept the referendum proposals is responsible for the Bill being before the House, and I would ask for the tolerance of the Chair——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Chair does not wish to have the discussion widened but does not mind a passing reference to the referendum without elaborating on the issues.

Mr. Lyons

I shall bow to that ruling. The people gave the decision and it is no use now for any Deputy on any side to attempt to deny that the people took such action. They took it in a manner that possibly nobody on any side of the House could have believed possible. They made the decisions so clear by their massive vote against the referendum proposals that never again, I think, in the history of the State will such proposals be put before them.

The Government, and possibly the Minister for Local Government, were proved wrong in this. It has been said that this was "Boland's madness" rather than a decision of the Fianna Fáil Government but whether it was "Boland's madness" that was responsible for this referendum or not, the fact remains that the people spoke out loud and clear. The other night the Minister for External Affairs said it was because the Parties opposite had posed the questions in an untruthful way. He did not say it that way but the implication was that the reason why the majority of the electorate rejected the Bill was that we used propaganda that was not true and which was apparently designed to scare the people. Surely that was a naïve statement from the Minister for External Affairs? Surely he does not believe that our people are so naïve as to accept an argument of that kind? Surely the Fianna Fáil propaganda machine is greater and far more efficient than he would give it credit for? Surely he did not believe that the electorate would accept that kind of argument and that they could be scared and stampeded into taking an action against their beliefs because the Fine Gael Party or the Labour Party had decided to use certain propaganda in order to beguile?

I wonder if this man really believes that this is so but whether he believes it or not, this Bill is before us now as a direct result of what the people did in the polling booths. I do not know why the Minister should have taken the action he did or why he should have put the proposals before the people knowing that, in 1959, the people had rejected this idea and, at the same time as they rejected it, they elected one of the greatest figures in the political life of this country as President of Ireland. That illustrious gentleman had come out in favour of a change in the electoral system and yet the people elected him to office but rejected his proposal. Surely any sane man in Fianna Fáil should have seen the red light and should have known that the people would reject both proposals in the referendum of 1968?

Acting Chairman (Mr. Booth)

The Deputy is straying from the terms of the Bill before the House. Discussion of the referendum has already been ruled out of order.

Mr. Lyons

I listened to the Minister for External Affairs straying very much the other night. However, I will accept your ruling. If a rule is made for Deputies, it should apply also to Ministers. However, I am not going to argue that point and I bow to the ruling of the Chair. There were many other methods of devising constituency boundaries than the one adopted by the Minister for Local Government.

It has been clearly shown in this House by Deputy Patrick Hogan of Fine Gael that there were methods of devising constituency boundaries to give us exactly the same number of Deputies and that, instead of moving 101,000 people from the constituencies where they hitherto had voted, the same result could have been achieved by moving 35,000 people. Senator Garret FitzGerald writing in the Irish Independent, also explained, and had maps to prove it, that this should have been done in a certain way. The charge against the Minister of drawing up constituency boundary lines in order to ensure, in so far as is possible, that Fianna Fáil people would be elected, is well substantiated and the House must realise that this is true.

Many Deputies, including Deputy Connor who is not satisfied with the changes in his constituency, believe that the people they have represented for a considerable period of time will feel a sense of loss. All of us in constituencies that have been carved or dismembered will feel the same sense of loss. Deputy Boland, apparently, did not ask some of his Fianna Fáil people or some of his Fianna Fáil Deputies for their opinions. He just decided arbitrarily to carve the constituencies in a certain way and to let the Deputies and the electors take the consequences.

There would be no need for this Bill if Fianna Fáil had adopted the suggestion that Deputy Connor mentioned a few minutes ago—a conference with the other Parties in the Dáil to try to divide the constituencies in such a way that boundaries, in so far as is possible, would follow county lines and traditional lines and that fair representation was given in relation to rural areas and also, of course, to the urban areas. A means of doing that could have been devised with the consent of all Parties in the Dáil and if Deputy Boland's madness had not driven him to put the proposals before the people he could have introduced an amendment to the Constitution that would have enabled him to disregard the High Court judge's decision of 1961.

Certainly this House could decide to pass a Bill through Dáil Éireanna Bill that would be designed to give fair representation to the west of Ireland and to rural areas without being unfair to the urban areas and to the cities. That was within the competence of Dáil Éireann and if that were not achieved, and if a tolerance Bill, independent of changes in the electoral system, had been proposed in this House, the House would certainly have passed it.

The Minister for Local Government must be taken to task for not doing that and Fianna Fáil may long be sorry for not having advised their Minister. The men at the Party meetings could have said: "We know the rural areas need greater representation; we know that the urban areas are growing and growing and as they grow the danger exists that representation for the west and for all the other rural areas will fall more out of balance." Certainly, the Government could have devised a Bill that would have been passed through the Dáil in order to ensure that such representation was given. However, they did not do that and there is no doubt that the charges made against them of doing it in order to attain more power are true. They did it to ensure that men who had grown stale in power would remain in power for a longer period without having to fight for their constituencies.

The people, as I said, rejected the idea but certainly there must be people in Fianna Fáil now who are sorry that they did not attempt to bring this idea before the Minister and before the Government. They may be very sorry as time goes on because I believe that at the next election the people will remember that the Fianna Fáil Government played politics when there was an economic situation building up in this country that could become dangerous, which has been shown by the mini-Budget as something on which the Government should take drastic and immediate action. It was a matter of fiddling while Rome burned. It was a matter of fiddling with a referendum when the economic situation was deteriorating from day to day. I do not talk about a tug-of-war in the Fianna Fáil Party. That has nothing to do with the House and nothing to do with the country but I do say this. They will stand before the bar of judgement at the next election and the people will decide whether the Party that fiddled while the economic situation was deteriorating are entitled to come back as the Government in the future.

The people will vote massively against the Fianna Fáil Party at the next election and it will be their just due because any Party, Sir, that so miscalculated public opinion in this country, any Party that was so far off the pulse of public opinion, certainly does not deserve the support of the electorate and are not competent to rule the country in the interests of all the people.

Acting Chairman

The Deputy is straying back to the referendum again.

Mr. Lyons

I thank you, Sir. Possibly you are being lenient with me or possibly I am not as familiar with the rules of procedure as others but I crave your indulgence in this case.

Mr. James Tully

You are doing very well.

Mr. Lyons

The Minister for External Affairs the other night spoke about members of the Fine Gael Party, the Leader of Fine Gael and almost a majority of Fine Gael being in favour of the single seat. Others said that at the Fine Gael Party meeting there definitely was a very narrow margin between the people who wanted to hold PR and those who wanted the single seat. I want to deny that with all the vehemence I can because I was present at the Party meeting and I can assure the House that the majority for retaining PR was a very strong one. That is a certainty. The Minister smiles. Possibly he thinks that does not matter. Perhaps it does not matter but I just mention it to refute the allegations made across the House. It is wrong. Whether it was right or wrong does not matter now because the people have spoken. Perhaps, we could quote what the illustrious man in the Park said about it years ago and, perhaps, we could quote what Deputy James Dillon said about it years ago but this has no bearing on the situation now. The people will say to themselves that the Fianna Fáil Party had support for a long time and that they are not capable of doing a job in the way in which they should do it. I think the electorate will be massively against them at the next election because of the mistakes they made.

Mr. Sylvester Barrett

Like most other people, I appreciate the onerous task facing the Minister for Local Government. No county has suffered as badly as my constituency in the re-arrangement of the constituencies. In County Clare we have a situation in which some 14,000 of the population have been taken out of the county and put in with Galway, forming a new constituency. This is probably one of the most historic constituencies in Ireland and Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and all political Parties deplore what has happened here but at least we appreciate that something like this was inevitable in view of the result of the vote on the Third Amendment of the Constitution Bill.

In Clare a few weeks ago, before the referendum, Opposition members of the county council called a special meeting to advise people to vote against the Third Amendment and the other day— last Monday—another special meeting was called to protest against the rearrangements of the constituencies. Anyway, the people appreciate that something like this was inevitable. At least it can be said that transferring 14,000 people out of the county is better than the transfer of a small number, such as 6,000 or 7,000. In this 14,000 of the population there are close on 10,000 voters who are on the electoral list and this gives an opportunity to the people of this area to enter in the next election a Clare man as one of their TDs.

I am sure they will see it this way and they will go about doing that when the time comes. We appreciate that the Minister when coming to Clare did not depart from the pattern which he followed for the rest of Ireland, that is, creating three-seat constituencies which, at least, are smaller and more manageable than some of the four-seaters now in existence. It means that a TD has far less ground to cover in order to look after the interests of his constituents. Perhaps, three seats will do better in the future. It is hard for people to knuckle down to this and be any way joyous about it. The first reaction of everyone was that of disappointment. As I have said, we appreciate that we are no worse off than a county like Leitrim. This gives us an opportunity to elect a Clare man and be represented by a Clare man in that part of the constituency.

We have a growing population in County Clare and after the next census, perhaps, we will have the required population to enable us to revert to the four-seat constituency we had. We look forward to the day when we will have all the electors in the county again united as one constituency, that is, the constituency of Clare.

Mrs. Burke

I think the Government have wasted a lot of time and taxpayers' money during the past 12 months. It might have been necessary to revise the constituencies but it is quite clear that the real purpose of the Bill is to preserve the interests of the Government. Were it not for the mass emigration from the west we could have, at least, four to six more seats. This is entirely due to the mismanagement of the Government in not providing jobs for the people. In my constituency alone they have taken from me 48 polling booths, giving to Clare-Galway 1,975 of a population and 7,938 from Roscommon to East Galway—a total of 9,913. The Minister should leave County Roscommon unmolested. It has a population of 56,228 and, with 4,424 from Athlone West Urban, we have 60,652 of a population. This would give us a three-seat constituency and a little to spare. Of course, it is quite obvious why we got the Athlone West Urban: it is to consolidate the position of the Minister for Education, Deputy Brian Lenihan. I might add that, in taking away all along the Suck there was taken with it also the drainage of the Suck which was one of the Minister's main problems in the constituency and which had been promised to the constituents in the 1964 by-election. This is not a revision: it is a butchering of the areas.

Mr. N. Lemass

I shall deal with the individual constituencies only to the absolute minimum. I should like to speak about constituencies in general rather than about constituencies in particular. I may be able to do this as a Dublin Deputy better than people from rural Ireland where certain county boundaries had to be breached. The last speaker has claimed that the main purpose of this Bill is to protect the interest of the Government. I say that this cannot be shown to be true to any extent in the city or county of Dublin, including Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown.

In the last general election, in the constituencies as they now exist, Fianna Fáil won two seats out of three in Dublin South East; three seats out of five in Dublin South West; Central; three seats out of five in Dublin County; one seat out of three in Dublin North West; two seats out of four in Dublin North Central and failed, after a very long count, by a margin of a total of four votes, to secure the majority of seats in Dublin North East.

My objection to this Bill, if I have any, is that, from the time I entered politics in 1956 and when we first succeeded in securing three seats in Dublin South West in 1957 we felt we had achieved something because it was the first time since the establishment of that constituency that Fianna Fáil secured a majority of the seats. In the subsequent by-election we lost the additional seat by a little over 50 votes and we did not regain it in the next general election but we did regain it in the last one—and comfortably, if I may say so. I believe the main reason the Fianna Fáil voluntary organisation was able to bring about this situation in Dublin was that most of the constituencies had an odd number of seats and where you have one Deputy out of three or two Deputies out of five, then everybody with the slightest interest in Fianna Fáil will come out to try to help to achieve a majority of the seats. When you have an even number of seats, there is apt to be complacency—and I mean this on all sides, including the Fianna Fáil Party. A lot of them will say: "Four seats: Fianna Fáil will probably get two out of four." If you add the figures I have given for Dublin it will be seen, by simple mathematics, that Fianna Fáil will not only be able to hold its present position in Dublin city, but will probably end up maybe a seat less—that is, if these straightforward mathematics work out. This does not always happen. We know you cannot have straightforward mathematics. As a Fine Gael speaker will say, the Government Party was guilty of gross miscalculation in putting the referendum issue to the people but I would point out that for a whole week before the end of that campaign, nobody in the Fine Gael Party would offer better than even money and, therefore, they also were guilty of miscalculation on that particular issue.

I have no doubt at all that even the young people coming up today have been told by their fathers and mothers of the time of the recession of 1956 and 1957 when their fathers lost their employment. That was the time when people who had been in jobs for 18, 20 and 30 years found themselves out on the dole. We found families breaking up. We had no housing shortage, certainly, because we had nobody to take the houses, and there was not the price of a bag of cement in the coffers when Fianna Fáil came back. Fianna Fáil offers job security.

Mr. Lyons

In Manchester or in Coventry.

Mr. N. Lemass

We had to restore their jobs for them after their experience of two disastrous Coalition Government here. One has only to drive around the outskirts of Dublin now to see the factories and alongside them the houses erected for the people whereas the Coalition Government could not get people for the houses which were lying empty.

Mr. Lyons

They had more houses, certainly. You have not that yet.

Mr. N. Lemass

We have factories alongside the houses. We are expanding urban Dublin so fast that I think everybody is now aware of the grave traffic crisis in Dublin city—because this is Fianna Fáil policy. In Dublin, Fianna Fáil policy will be accepted by the people so long as they know they have a pay packet on every Friday night and that their job is secure; so long as they know they will get reasonable rises in their wages and reasonable increases in their living standards as time goes on. This is what Fianna Fáil have been giving and now offer.

With regard to the measures that had to be taken recently, in good anticipation of the world situation, the ordinary worker in Dublin is secure in his employment and is better off now than he was in 1957.

Acting Chairman

Would Deputy Lemass relate his remarks to the measure which is before the House?

Mr. N. Lemass

If we had a situation whereby we had three-seat and five-seat constituencies in Dublin I promise the Minister for Local Government and the Taoiseach that the people will give them a majority of the seats in the Dáil in Dublin.

Mr. James Tully

What about the local elections?

Mr. N. Lemass

They are different.

Mr. James Tully

You will find out whether or not they are different.

Mr. N. Lemass

Will the Chair allow me to answer that remark? In three and five-seat constituencies in Dublin, we elected only one councillor but three TDs in the following general election. This happened after the second last local election.

Mr. James Tully

Job security.

Mr. N. Lemass

Job security has nothing to do with the county council. Certain international problems have adequately been dealt with by the Government. I imagine this Bill has been considered on more than one occasion by the Government before it was eventually produced. I do not believe the Government will lightly amend the recommendations put before the House. Unfortunately, I have not all the reports with me that I would like to have now because I found that the speeches were shorter this evening than usual, which is a good thing: sometimes we should have a rule here, as they have in the local authorities, about ten-minute and 15-minute speeches. Deputy Dockrell opened the debate this morning and concluded it last week. He referred to old Dublin and to the fact that the constituency he represented for so long had been changed beyond recognition and that all south Dublin, where the Dockrell name and family have been established for so long, had been reduced in size. He recollected how this constituency used to extend almost from the Pigeon House right up to the county boundary. He asked that the constituency be extended. I support that request. I would prefer to see the constituency a five-seat constituency, as it was before, and my own constituency made, if necessary, into a three-seat constituency.

I should like to refer now to Deputy Briscoe, as reported in tonight's Evening Herald, page 8; he said:

A lot of the debate was sheer hypocrisy and the charge of gerrymandering did not stand up to examination. He believed that three-seat constituencies were better because they would make it possible for people to have closer contact with their TDs.

I support this general view of Deputy Briscoe. At the moment it would appear that Deputy Briscoe and myself are likely to contest the same constituency. I would prefer to see this constituency either reduced to three seats or increased to five seats because in a four-seat constituency I believe the ordinary run of the people will not show the great enthusiasm I have seen them showing over the years. From what I read of Deputy Maurice Dockrell's speech last week and Deputy Briscoe's tonight, I think I am in line with both of them and I would ask the Minister to examine this question of the even number seat constituencies, particularly in South Dublin. I cannot speak so well for North Dublin because we are sometimes described as provinces apart. As the Bill stands, it is more than likely I will seek to represent Dublin South Central. I shall be sorry to lose the people of Drimnagh who gave me such very valuable support in the last general election, but I will be very glad to get back the people in Rathfarnham whom I represented when I was first elected.

I understand that it has been suggested to Deputy Maurice Dockrell that he should leave the old South Central constituency and contest Dublin South-West. I should like to warn him that I suspect this suggestion has come from Deputy Richie Ryan, who is anxious to protect himself and anxious to prevent my very good friend from Fine Gael, the former Deputy Jim O'Keeffe, and Councillor Maurice O'Connell from securing election to this House. He is afraid he may be asked to contest that area which elected him in third place in the second last local authority election. I should like to remind Deputy Richie Ryan that he barely took the last seat in what is now Dublin South-Central, the area he has intimated he intends to contest in future elections.

I should like to go on record that I believe the people of Dublin will stand firmly behind Fianna Fáil in a general election.

Mr. Coughlan

The same as they did in the referendum.

Mr. N. Lemass

I believe that we should give them an opportunity of electing a clear majority of fianna Fáil TDs in Dublin city because that is the only way they will know they will have a job to go to next week, and that that job will be secure; that is the only way they will know that there will be jobs for their children, when they grow up, and free education for them while they are children. I am certain the people of Dublin will stand behind Fianna Fáil and give them a majority of the seats, if this Bill gives them the opportunity of doing so.

Mr. Treacy

Wishful thinking.

Mr. Coogan

One almost feels there is a threat in what Deputy Lemass has just said: if the people are not prepared to accept Fianna Fáil they will be out of their jobs in the morning.

Mr. N. Lemass

I am not going by satellite to America anyway-that is for sure.

Mr. Coogan

As far as the people are concerned, it would be better if the Deputy went to the moon.

An Ceann Comhairle

Would the Deputy relate his remarks now to the Bill?

Mr. Coogan

Deputy Lemass is the son of another Deputy in this House who was going to lead the people into a land flowing with milk and honey, with 100,000 more jobs.

Mr. N. Lemass

60,000 will do for a start.

An Ceann Comhairle

Order.

Mr. Coogan

Let the Deputy contain himself for a moment. Does he disagree with the figures issued by the Department, figures which prove beyond all doubt that there are 1,000 fewer people in employment today than there were this time last year?

An Ceann Comhairle

That does not arise.

Mr. Coogan

It arises in so far as there are over 1,000 fewer people employed here today and they will not have votes because they are over in Coventry.

An Ceann Comhairle

We are discussing the revision of Dáil constituencies.

Mr. Coogan

That is so but, with respect, before you came in, we had to listen to Deputy Lemass talking about the factories and the pay packets and the number of people who are in employment but who would be out of employment in certain eventualities. There was a threat of unemployment. I am just wondering are the Taca men wagging their fingers at the people. I represent a constituency that has not been affected by this proposed revision but, if it suited Fianna Fáil, they would have carved up my constituency too. It suits them as it is because it is a three-seat constituency. That is why Fianna Fáil did not get moving in that particular area. I would be adopting an attitude of "I'm all right, Jack" if I were not to comment, however briefly, on this revision. We had a Deputy from Clare a few moments ago describing the historic county of Clare. I do not know what he meant. Maybe I have an idea. The historic county of Clare was being cut up. He tried to suppress his feelings but, of course, he had been brainwashed, as a great many members of the Party are when they come in here, and he must toe the line like all the rest.

Mr. Lalor

It could not happen to the Deputy.

Mr. Coogan

My brains are better than that. It could not be done by Fianna Fáil, and neither would I be brow-beaten by them. I have been in this House for 14½ years in spite of Fianna Fáil. This Bill is a monument to Fianna Fáil, to the great "Fianna Failure." They were to save the west. The population of the west has now been depleted and the people are "gone west". If we had issued a postal ballot paper to the men from the west who are in Coventry and Birmingham and spread all over the world due to Fianna Fáil failure, or "Fianna Failure" as they are known, Fianna Fáil would have got the greatest mauling they ever got in their lifetime from those people.

The Minister seems to be licking his wounds after the great mauling he got in the referendum. As I see it, this is a savage attack by the Minister on the people for not having accepted Fianna Fáil policy. With this carving up I can see the Minister in no other role than that of Jack the Ripper. He gets his knife out and stabs here and there to get his own back on the people. Fianna Fáil seem to be very complacent. They seem to think the people are fools, but they forget there is a voters' list. They may fool the old people, but they will not fool the youth. In the future they are likely to get the mauling they deserve.

Deputy Lemass said a few minutes ago that while he agreed with the Bill he had some reservations. He said he would like the Minister to do this and look at that. Can they not do their dirty washing in their Party room without letting it overflow in here? It shows that there is no unanimity in the Party. Let us hope that when it comes to casting his vote for or against this Bill he will take the right side.

I said I would be brief. Fianna Fáil are on the way down, and they are going faster than they think. The Taca men are deserting them like rats deserting a sinking ship.

An Ceann Comhairle

That has absolutely nothing to do with the Bill. We are discussing the revision of the constituencies.

Mr. Coogan

There is a lot of poison out and it is not rat poison. I see them deserting all over the country. Those are the votes that will desert Fianna Fáil.

Mr. Lalor

Who will they vote for?

Mr. Coogan

The Parliamentary Secretary will be surprised.

Mr. Lalor

Fine Gael?

Mr. Coogan

When it comes to the day of reckoning what the Parliamentary Secretary is saying will be on the record and he may have his nose rubbed in it. Early on at the referendum count there was a lovely aroma of cigars.

An Ceann Comhairle

I wonder would the Deputy come to the Bill. He is not being relevant.

Mr. Coogan

In the evening you could not smell even a Woodbine. The Taca men had deserted when they saw how the count was going. The Minister is back. As I said he is licking his wounds. This patchwork quilt Bill is a monument to "Fianna Failure". The people had to leave the west due to a lack of employment which Deputy Lemass said was available. His father said he would provide 100,000 new jobs. The jobs are in England. If those men had a postal vote we know the reply Fianna Fáil would have got from them.

Mr. Moore

I want to try to be a bit original and speak to the Bill because Deputy Coogan——

Mr. Coogan

I was answering Deputy Lemass.

Mr. Moore

——hardly mentioned the Bill before the House tonight. Any electoral Bill is bound to be criticised by the Opposition and by some of the Government Party, because to get a perfect Bill the Minister's name would have to be Solomon and not Boland. I think this is a fair effort to give us an electoral pattern so that the people's voice will be heard in a truly representative way.

It is galling to hear Deputies speaking of gerrymandering. It is impossible to gerrymander in a country like ours. We have not got a ghetto pattern. This is not Little Rock or Derry. We have not got all the Fianna Fáil supporters living in one area and the Fine Gael and Labour supporters living in others. All our skins are white. I am not boasting when I say that but just making the point.

During the referendum debate it was pointed out by Opposition speakers that you cannot gerrymander under the PR system which they wanted to keep. The Minister had a difficult task. He has not pleased everyone but what he has done shows that we are truly a democracy. In the space of a few months the electoral system has been reviewed by the people and by the Oireachtas. This shows the desire of the Government Party to ensure that one basic rule of democracy, that is, a person's right to vote, will be preserved. The people have spoken on the system they want, and we will now try to make the best of it. It has been said that many areas were butchered or charged to suit the Minister or someone else. That is quite absurd. You cannot do that in a society like ours. I can speak for the city only. In the city there is not a Fianna Fáil area, a Labour area or a Fine Gael area.

Mr. Coughlan

It is all Labour.

Mr. Moore

There are places in which at one time there was a Fine Gael majority and others in which there was a Fianna Fáil majority.

Mr. Coughlan

They are all Labour now.

Mr. Moore

I will not interrupt the Deputy's pipe dream. He can go on saying that. If he says it often enough he will believe it is true, but the election will bring him back to earth with a great shock.

I have one fault to find with this Bill. I am speaking now not as a politician but purely as a native of this city. I wish the Minister had kept to the old ward boundaries as far as possible. The wards system in this city dates back for many hundreds of years. We claim that in the time of Grattan's Parliament those wards were there. The whole structure of society has changed since then but the fundamentals have not changed. The people of this city when exercising their franchise want to do so in their local areas so far as possible.

If you mention the wards—the Royal Exchange wards, the Mansion House ward, Pembroke East and Pembroke West—you might say that the very names are redolent of the old regime. Maybe they are, but at the same time they are the basis of our electoral system in the city. We should by all means preserve these wards. It will not always be possible for the Minister to do so. I know he tries hard, but perhaps he could try harder to keep these wards intact because the city, like the rural part of the country, has certain traditions. You have a class of people who hold certain broad political views which they like to express. The city goes back to the Norman invasion. These city people have a wonderful sense of independence. Deputy Dockrell of Fine Gael has praised the spirit of the people and I do the same. Throughout the history of the country they have fought for this independence and they have not been broken down by the enemy. Despite the cutting off of the wards they will come forward and vote as they think best, always expressing their consideration for the country as a whole and for the city in particular.

I do not think there is any attempt to gerrymander. We know it is not true. It is impossible to gerrymander the constituencies. If certain Deputies on the Opposition side are hit, let them remember some of us on this side will also be hit. It is something which is very hard to avoid. To suggest gerrymandering is to damage the national image because it is not true that it has been done. I do not think it can be done. During the remaining Stages the Bill should be examined again. I would be all in favour of being fair to any Opposition Deputy who could prove conclusively that he is, in fact, being unduly injured by the new changes. If we are going to preserve democracy in this country in face of the attacks made on it, not only here but also in Europe generally, not only must an electoral Bill be fair but the changes must appear to the people to be fair. We can only do this by having a Bill brought in here after careful consideration and put to the House saying: "This is our honest effort to make the best of the changes which we must make". I am quite convinced that the Minister has made an honest and genuine effort not to please the Fianna Fáil Party, the Fine Gael Party or the Labour Party Deputies but to give the best possible set-up in the electoral areas so that the people can express their will in a very democratic way and give us a good Parliament.

Mr. Treacy

You are a very innocent man.

Mr. Moore

I am trying not to be partisan. I am thinking not only of my own Party or myself in this matter, but I am trying to think of the Oireachtas. Somebody said that corruption does harm to governments. It harms the country as a whole. We see it happening in Europe, which is not very far away. We are lucky in so far as we have had in the periods since the State was founded a democratic Government. At times this was a very good Fianna Fáil Government and at times we had another Government, but to suggest gerrymandering is to damage this image. Some people would believe it. It is our duty here to give the people an opportunity to elect a representative Parliament. I believe in the integrity and the intelligence of the people doing this. The issues should not be clouded by unfounded suggestions that the Minister has done something wrong. No matter what Minister sat where the present Minister sits tonight somebody would criticise him because they were hurt by the proposals in the Bill or because they did not get the areas they wanted. They say that the people get the Government they deserve, and I suppose that an area gets the Deputy it deserves. Unless there are people who will examine the claims of every person putting himself forward for election— and people do this—they will not be sure of getting the best people to form the best Government. I have no doubt that the Fianna Fáil Party will occupy these benches after the next election but I do not think that even this is the most important thing. The most important thing is that the people should have chosen the Government whom they think is best fitted to serve. Until we get away from those charges of gerrymandering and corruption we will not improve the image of this House. It would be very easy to make countercharges to the Opposition charges about Taca. I should love to meet a Taca man.

Mr. Coughlan

They are very plentiful and are well paid for it.

Mr. Moore

The Deputy is speaking for his own Party. I am speaking for the Party here.

Mr. Coughlan

Is the Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries not the Joint Treasurer?

Mr. Moore

I am not discussing Taca. Most Opposition Deputies feel that unless Taca is mentioned there is something wrong with the debate.

Mr. Treacy

They are extinct anyway.

Mr. Moore

In conclusion, I would like to make an earnest appeal to the Opposition to judge this Bill on its merits and to leave aside extraneous issues. There is plenty of time during the sessions here to debate the issues which we have heard discussed, like those of unemployment, emigration, and Taca. There is an obligation on the Government to bring in this Bill.

One point Deputy Coogan made was that the Fianna Fáil Party had to wash their dirty linen here. There is a duty on the Minister and on the Cabinet to bring in this Bill here. We in the Fianna Fáil Party make our views known when we are trying to be honest and criticise where criticism is necessary, and then we are accused of falling out. We are united behind our Leader, Deputy Jack Lynch, and in regard to this Bill, the people will show their confidence in the Party and will return them in the new electoral areas which Deputy Boland, the Minister for Local Government, has given to us in a fair and honest attempt to meet the situation which confronts him.

Mr. O'Malley

A Cheann Comhairle, so far as my own constituency of Limerick East is concerned, I have not heard any complaints whatever about the Bill. The change there is very slight and is an obvious one. Nobody could talk of gerrymandering. It is a small corner of east Limerick which jutted into west Limerick that has been taken out and put into west Limerick. There is no complaint there. The same thing applies to the majority of counties. A couple of counties have had to be divided up in a way that one would prefer to have avoided, in particular Leitrim, but my mind goes back to the beginning of the referendum campaign, when the Minister for Finance went down to a public meeting in Leitrim and told the people assembled there that if the Third Amendment of the Constitution Bill were not passed Leitrim probably would have to be divided by three, that it would not form a constituency of its own, that it would have to go in with others. He strongly advised the people of Leitrim, therefore, that if they wanted to avoid that situation they might support the Government's proposals in the referendum. The same advice was given in other counties and cities which were threatened with being divided up. That advice was not followed and, as a result, a certain amount of dividing up has had to go on. It has been carried out in much the same way as the Government forecast it would have to be carried out.

What strikes me as being utterly hypocritical is that the Fine Gael and Labour Parties come in here whining and complaining about the Minister for Local Government butchering the constituencies when the real people to blame are the Fine Gael and Labour Parties because, during a period of months they went up and down and around and about this country persuading the electorate to vote "No" on the Third Amendment of the Constitution Bill. They told the people there was no harm in the breaching of county boundaries, that it was better to do that than to accept the Bill.

They got what they asked for and, having got that, having forced the Minister for Local Government into the position of having to divide counties— he had first of all told the people that they would be faced with this—Fine Gael and Labour come back and complain and whine because the Minister has to do it. They are the people who are to blame, and it is complete hypocrisy on their part that they should attack the Minister and accuse him of all sorts of low tactics and of vindictiveness. The Minister has carried out what he told the people before the referendum he would have to carry out if the proposals in the referendum were not accepted. These proposals were not accepted because of the opposition put up to them by Fine Gael and Labour. Therefore, it is obvious that Fine Gael and Labour must take the blame for the unfortunate situation that now threatens Leitrim, Clare and other areas where people are being cut off from the main body of the people in their own counties.

We in Fianna Fáil have nothing to be ashamed of in this Bill. The Minister had an unpleasant duty to perform and he did it with the absolute minimum of butchering and carving up. If he had wanted to be vindictive, there is nothing to stop him carving up every county and forming constituencies bearing no relation to county boundaries. He did it to the minimum extent possible and any fairminded person will agree that he did it without fear or favour.

Though some Fine Gael Members and Labour Members may not be suited by it, an equal number of Fianna Fáil Members are not suited by it. Deputy L'Estrange tonight repeatedly made the allegation that this Bill was discussed at Fianna Fáil Party meetings before it was finally decided. Deputy Briscoe pointed out that that was not so. It was not discussed before it was published. The first and only time it was discussed at a Fianna Fáil Party meeting was after the Bill had been circulated to Deputies.

It is perhaps typical of the hypocritical Fine Gael approach that, having caused this situation, they now turn around and say Fianna Fáil are trying to use it to their own advantage. This situation was caused by Fine Gael and Labour, not by the Minister for Local Government who is now being accused of so many low tactics. The Minister has done a difficult job very well and, apart from this hypocritical whining from Fine Gael and Labour Deputies, no serious fault has been found with the Bill among the general public.

Mr. Foley

First, let me say I want to pay a special tribute to the Minister for the manner in which he has carried out the difficult task of dividing up the constituencies, particularly for the manner in which he has tried to preserve county boundaries. In all the Minister's speeches, here and throughout the country during the referendum campaign, at all times he tried to explain to the people that he wished to preserve county boundaries. What amazes me is the weeping and whining of the Opposition, having received exactly what they asked for during the referendum. Here in the House they cry bitter tears because the Bill is before them. They say it involves gerrymandering.

I have no doubt Members of the Opposition are peeved by the division of some constituencies. They fear that in that division they may be isolated, whereas they would like to see themselves in a position where their only opposition would be perhaps a local councillor or some unknown outsider. The reason they are peeved is that they may have to face a Fianna Fáil Deputy or they may find themselves facing each other.

In regard to my own constituency of County Dublin I am peeved in many ways, particularly because I lose an area which was very good to me —Tallaght, Rathfarnham, Dundrum, Bohernabreena, Newcastle, Saggart and other districts. Deputy P.J. Burke has lost a similar area. Though we are peeved, we realise at the same time that this was necessary. The referendum was held, the people did not accept the proposals put to them, and therefore a division of constituencies had to take place.

The situation in County Dublin has caused annoyance to Opposition Deputies, particularly to Deputy Clinton. I know the reason why. It is because Deputy Clinton will now be in a constituency to be contested by the Minister for Local Government. It is a constituency in which Deputy Clinton has not done any work, relatively speaking. He has never tried to help the people there as Fianna Fáil Deputies have done. Deputy Clinton made specific references to me, to Deputy Burke and to the Minister. He said the Minister is aggrieved, that he wants to get rid of Deputy Burke because at all times Deputy Burke has topped the poll. Deputy Clinton can say things like that but there is no truth in them. The Minister has always worked solely for the good of the people whom he has represented as a member of Fianna Fáil. He is not particularly worried whether he tops the poll or not. It might be well to remind Deputy Clinton, who is so measly minded as to make reference to people in their absence—I have on two occasions been listening to the debate in the Whip's Office when Deputy Clinton made reference to me and I say this in his absence but his colleagues will probably convey it to him—that Deputy Clinton was the last man elected in the five-seat constituency of County Dublin at the last election. Deputy Clinton was elected without reaching the quota and he was an elected representative before the last election. I came into the field completely unknown to the people and I was elected prior to Deputy Clinton, and I reached the quota. Deputy Clinton should bear this in mind when he says that the Minister is trying to safeguard me. I challenge Deputy Clinton here and now to come out and to defend his seat in North County Dublin with me and we will see how he gets on. I know well he would not do it. I know well the work on which he is engaged is for a small sector of the community who are arrogant at all times against the Fianna Fáil Party and who have displayed it in many ways not alone by marches and other political demonstrations. Deputy Clinton has been assisting these people but he will see that this is not a true reflection of the people of County Dublin.

I want to say that in County Dublin in general the Minister did what I would term a reasonably good job. As I have said, I am aggrieved at losing areas which were particularly good to me at the last election but I am convinced that the Fianna Fáil Members have worked sufficiently hard to ensure their own re-election. I am sure the people of County Dublin received good enough representation from the Fianna Fáil Party and the Government to ensure that the Fianna Fáil Members are returned to office. I cannot speak for the Opposition Members because seldom was the Fine Gael Member ever seen doing anything constructive in the area. As for the Labour Member he has concentrated on the area of Ballyfermot but this concentration seems to be wilting away because Fianna Fáil has a Deputy who has worked hard in the area, who has got down to business and who is now changing the erroneous ideas given to the people of Ballyfermot by the Labour Deputy.

I compliment the Minister on the manner in which he divided the constituencies. I compliment him on the manner in which he received allegations made by the Opposition Deputies and I have no doubt that he in his reply will deal with those people.

Mr. Cunningham

Prior to the referendum we had a number of articles appearing in certain daily newspapers, articles written by a Fine Gael Senator, and in regard to Leitrim the suggestion was that Donegal should be a five-seat constituency and an area of Donegal put into Leitrim. This was supposed to solve the problems which might arise in relation to any forthcoming legislation on the revision of the constituencies.

During the referendum campaign in Donegal this suggestion was backed up by, above all people, a Donegal Deputy, also of the Fine Gael Party. He said that any thinking voter in Donegal would vote against the referendum proposal and would agree with the sensible suggestion that Donegal should be a five-seat constituency and that the balance of 8,000 or 9,000 Donegal people could be put in with County Leitrim. This is on the record of this House because he repeated it here.

Now, if there is such an outcry by Fine Gael and by Labour against the crossing of county boundaries, why is it that they see nothing wrong with this suggestion by a Fine Gael economist who is used to dealing in figures, whose business it is to deal in figures —and facts I hope, too—and a Fine Gael Deputy? But the Minister, who is tied to a 20,000 figure of population per Deputy, is criticised. It has been called gerrymandering but the suggestion put forward in respect of Leitrim and Donegal by two prominent Fine Gael people has not been branded as gerrymandering. It is very difficult to understand the mentality of people who, on the one hand, advocate a situation like this themselves and who, when somebody else does the very same thing, describe it as gerrymandering. We in Donegal would object as violently to having some Donegal people going into a Leitrim constituency as Leitrim is now objecting to having their people go into a Donegal constituency. It is as simple as that.

The other problem which has arisen for Leitrim is that they find themselves as a Sligo-Leitrim constituency. You must remember that there is more than one two-county constituency in the Schedule of this Bill. You have Sligo-Leitrim, South West Donegal-Leitrim, Roscommon-Leitrim and Clare-Gal-way. There are many others. All of these problems arise because the Minister was tied within certain limits, but the problem admittedly becomes more acute in a county with a population of over 50,000 people. The county has just enough population for two Deputies. Therefore, had there been a constituency of Leitrim it would have not alone taken in that part of Donegal suggested by Fine Gael, but parts of other counties as well. So that there, again, there would be wholesale breaches of county boundaries. As far as Donegal beis concerned—I speak of Donegal because I know the situation there—one must start at Malin Head. In order to get the required number one cannot go anywhere else. I think the Minister—I did not discuss this with him before the Bill was circulated—has done a reasonable job here. Here you have a county which has kept the setup which it had apart from the taking in of a certain portion of the Leitrim constituency. If all the Members of this House were in the Minister's position and were asked to do the same job and 143 blueprints were superimposed on one another it certainly would be a jigsaw puzzle.

If we were given a pencil to do as we wished I do not believe that there are two Deputies in this House who would come up with the same blueprint. Accordingly, when a person comes up with a blueprint for all of us it is only logical to assume that all of us can disagree on it. It would be impossible to provide one which would satisfy all Deputies and all Parties and this one does not do so. Before we saw it we did not expect it would.

Mr. T. O'Donnell

Deputy Noel Lemass spoke loudly in praise of the Fianna Fáil policy in recent years which has resulted in the fact that Dublin now gains an increased representation. Under the proposals in this Bill the number of Deputies in Dublin will be increased by four. He attributed this increase to the success of the Fianna Fáil economic policy in recent years but Deputy Noel Lemass very cleverly avoided any reference to another aspect of this Bill.

The explanatory memorandum circulated with the Bill says: "The purpose of this Bill is to revise Dáil constituencies in the light of the 1966 Census returns". Deputy Noel Lemass dealt with one aspect of this. However, there is another aspect of it which to my mind shows the most significant and the most tragic effect of the Bill. After 40 years of native Government we have now a situation in which the west of Ireland is losing three Dáil representatives. When one looks at the census returns for 1966 one finds that in the Province of Connaught between the years 1926 and 1966, a period of 40 years, the population of Connaught fell by 150,957. Between the years 1956 and 1966 the population of the Province of Connaught fell by 44,271 people. The fact that the Bill is necessary to reduce the number of Deputies in the west of Ireland by three is a terrible indictment of the economic policies pursued by the Government, particularly the disastrous policies enshrined in the First and Second Programmes for Economic Expansion.

An Ceann Comhairle

That does not arise on his Bill.

Mr. T. O'Donnell

The decline in the west has gone so far now that County Leitrim has been written off the political map. It has been gerrymandered and butchered into three different sections. The Minister stated, and many Fianna Fáil spokesmen reiterated this during the referendum campaign, that it was desirable as far as possible to avoid having to breach county boundaries. Therefore, there is no reason why it was not possible to avoid doing this in the Bill.

As far as I am aware it was possible to make Donegal a five-seat constituency. Deputy Barrett from Clare mentioned that 14,000 people from Clare were going into the Clare-Galway constituency. He said this was a good thing because it would enable those 14,000 people to elect a Clare man to represent them in Dáil Éireann. I think I know the area it is proposed to transfer to Galway and if I know those 14,000 people I believe they would prefer to elect a Clare man to represent the constituency of Clare. It would have been much more desirable—and I am sure those 14,000 people would have preferred it—to have a Deputy returned for the constituency of Clare rather than for the constituency of Clare-Galway.

Fianna Fáil spokesmen say, and harp on this, that because Fine Gael and Labour succeeded to a remarkable degree in defending proportional representation during the recent referendum, we are now responsible for this measure. This Bill, as I have pointed out, and I think this is the most significant thing about it, is necessary because of the fact—I am sure the people of Ireland are now well aware of it—that Fianna Fáil failed to a remarkable degree to implement a realistic policy to retain the people in rural Ireland. In addition to that, faced with the fact that Fine Gael and Labour succeeded in retaining the system of proportional representation, the Government and particularly the Minister for Local Government, were then faced with having to revise the constituencies.

There is no doubt whatsoever that this Bill has been very cleverly designed with a view to ensuring as far as possible that the present Fianna Fáil Deputies would in so far as the Government can ensure it be returned after the next election. There is no justification whatsoever for the new constituency in Cork which stretches from Charleville right down to the coast. It is a long, narrow constituency, 90 miles long and there is no justification whatsoever for that division.

Mr. Crowley

The anomalies of PR.

Mr. T. O'Donnell

As my colleague, Deputy O'Malley from Limerick, said, there is only a very minor adjustment between east and west Limerick. I suppose I am one of the Deputies who are least affected in so far as our political fortune is concerned. The revision of the constituencies does not affect me at all and, therefore, I am trying to give as objective a view as possible on this whole thing.

The position then in regard to the west of Ireland, as many of my colleagues from the west who have spoken have said, is that they have lost three seats. I do not know whether one can go so far as to say, as some of my colleagues have said, but there are certainly grounds for saying, that this Bill is revenge on the people for having voted so overwhelmingly in the recent referendum for the retention of the system of proportional representation. As a Deputy who has been keenly interested for a long number of years in the welfare of the people of rural Ireland, as one who had the privilege of serving under the great apostle of rural Ireland, the late Canon Hayes, in the organisation he founded, Muintir na Tíre, I deplore the fact that we have now reached the stage where one western county is being wiped off the political map. I am confident that the people in the west of Ireland, when they will get the opportunity at the next general election, will vote in a very striking manner, just as they did in the referendum. They will express their opinion of the failure of Fianna Fáil to implement a proper economic policy and their votes will reflect their resentment of this attempt to gerrymander and butcher the western province.

Mr. Healy

It seems to me that the Opposition Parties are trying to defend an impossible position. The sole purpose of the recent referendum and the putting before the people of the Third Amendment was to avoid bringing this measure before the House. It was to avoid having to deprive the western seaboard of Deputies and transferring them to Dublin. We find the very Deputies who so confused the issue that the people who were most affected voted as they advised, that is, "No", coming into the House and trying to blame Fianna Fáil for doing what is absolutely necessary under the judgment of Mr. Justice Budd given in 1961. The Minister has no alternative. The Government have no alternative. They must carve up the constituencies. There is no tolerance that is worth while. The Minister is hamstrung.

It is colossal nerve for people to come in here and shed crocodile tears for a position for which they are mainly responsible. They themselves are responsible mainly for the position in which we find ourselves today. It is a sad position. It will be sadder still in future when there will be fewer Deputies representing the west. The last speaker spoke about the depopulation of the west. I am a southerner. In every country in the world people are leaving the land, leaving agriculture, for cities and industrial employment—I suppose on account of the better conditions there and because the people are now better educated.

We had here a Deputy from Cork city who has spent the last six or seven years in public and in private and in this House bemoaning the fact that three districts—Ballyclough, Blackrock and Douglas—were taken from his constituency and put into the city of Cork and for that reason he is no longer heading the poll and that it has been to the great detriment and handicap of his Party. Now that they are being given back to him and the city is united again, he came into the House last week and, although he could not criticise the fact that they were given back, he made slighting references as to what the Minister was going to do and what he had up his sleeve when putting these portions back into the city of Cork. Is it possible to please them? Of course, it is not. That is one of the benefits of being in Opposition. You can have it both ways. You can tell the people to vote "No" and then you can cry crocodile tears because the consequence of voting "No" is to deprive them of their representatives in Dáil Éireann. I agree with the Deputy who said that it would be impossible to get two men even of the same Party to draw up constituencies that would suit everybody. In fact, if Solomon himself were to return he could hardly please every Deputy in drawing up constituencies.

I think the Minister has done a fair job. Nothing has been pinpointed against him in regard to what he has done. Personally, although far away from the county, I am sorry that Leitrim has gone as a political entity but we know where the blame is and it is not on the Fianna Fáil side. I am perfectly certain of that. I am sorry because I am afraid, if this is to continue, we will see other counties going off the political map in the future, all because the people will never get another chance of voting for the proposition contained in the Third Amendment.

Mr. Coughlan

There will be nobody there.

Mr. Healy

It should be placed on the record that the reason for this measure having to be brought before the House, the Minister and the Government having nothing to do with it, is the judgment given in 1961 which the Third Amendment put before the people was designed to change and in respect of which they were confused by the Opposition Parties and advised to reject. If there is anything wrong with this measure, it is due entirely to the result of the referendum and the advice given to the people by the Opposition Parties.

Mrs. Hogan O'Higgins

I just want to say a few words—as my late colleague in this Party used to say—a few words for Clare—the new Clare/Galway constituency. While I have no objection to trying to work with the people of Clare—I regard myself as half Clare as the Hogans came from Clare—I feel that the people of Clare have no desire to be in with Galway. I know from the few contacts I have that they are very aggrieved to think that a Fianna Fáil Minister would do this to the most Fianna Fáil Minister county in the country. They feel they have been badly treated. The word I hear most often used is the "partition" of Clare. "Partition" is a dirty word in this country. That is how they feel. They feel that badly in Clare that this is the term they use for it.

I was given to understand when the Minister for Local Government was speaking about the redistribution of the constituencies prior to the referendum that the whole idea was to make constituencies, where possible, compact and not to breach county boundaries. If elected in the next general election, I will find myself representing part of three counties— Roscommon, Galway and Clare. It seems to me, in spite of what the previous speaker said, that the Minister is trying to penalise us in the west for defeating the proposition put forward in the referendum because he has breached every county boundary that he could possibly breach.

The only explanation I could imagine for the swipe at Roscommon was that possibly it would help Deputy Millar but he has changed his mind and I do not think he intends to avail of the little bonus he got in that end of the constituency.

I can see that amalgamation of Clare and Galway should help the Fianna Fáil people in the Galway end of the constituency. I do not agree with the Deputy from Clare who says that Clare will elect a Fianna Fáil Deputy on their own. I think this is impossible. I am sure they would like to because I think Clare people like to vote for Clare people. That is why I feel that I will get a vote in Clare. I think it was done purely to protect the Parliamentary Secretary, Deputy Carty. It certainly will not do anything to boost the Government in that area. The people feel they have been terribly let down.

I do not know why we must play musical chairs in the constituencies. When I was first elected to the House some 11 years ago I stood for South Galway. In those days Galway had three three-seat constituencies. In those early days, Fianna Fáil held six seats and the Opposition had three. Then we had a change of constituencies and East Galway was a five-seater and West Galway was a three-seater. Then the Government slipped and it became obvious that, if we were to retain a five-seater in East Galway or if we went down to a four-seater, the Government would then drop another seat. It could be argued that I might have lost a seat. Certainly I might, but it looked more likely that it would be a Fianna Fáil seat that would go. Obviously, there was hasty consultation by way of shoring up the slipping Fianna Fáil votes, so they turned it back into a three-seater. The Government have not been very smart, and I think that out of the nine seats for Galway they will lose one if not two extra seats.

I was rather amused when the last speaker, Deputy Healy, blamed the Deputies on the Opposition side of the House for the depopulation of the west. It must be admitted that the people are leaving the west because they do not find it economic to live there any longer. Surely we are not to blame for the economic state of the country? The Government, and solely the Government, are to blame for the flight from the land. It is interesting to note that since 1956 the population of Galway has gone down by 7,213 and I am afraid that in the next ten years there will be a similar drop unless we have a change of Government very quickly.

I agree with the large number of speakers here who said that the gerrymandering and the butchering—to use the words of the Minister for Industry and Commerce Deputy Colley, on television—has been done purely as a sort of revenge. I remember the Minister, Deputy Colley, on the night of the referendum stating that: "The people will be sorry when we come to the butchering of constituencies", and it looks as if the vendetta is being carried through to the bitter end. While we welcome the people of Clare into the new Galway constituency, I have sympathy for them in that this has been perpetrated on them, because it looks as if they only got enough to make their presence felt but not enough to give them a Deputy. However, I am sure that those of us in the Galway constituency who are elected will look after their interests as best we can.

Mr. Andrews

Ba mhaith liom comhgháirdeachas a dhéanamh leis an Aire as ucht an Bhille seo a chur ós ár gcomhair. Níl mórán le rá agam ina thaobh, agus ní chuirfidh mé moill rómhór ar an Teach leis na smaointí atá le nochtadh agam.

I should like to compliment the last speaker, Deputy Mrs. Hogan O'Higgins. It is grand to hear the women of the country, especially those in this House, saying their piece. We have accusations levelled at us from time to time in regard to the equality of women. If we had more women elected to Dáil Éireann we might be able to disabuse the minds of people who feel we are against women in politics. We are all in favour of women in this House, regardless of political allegiance.

Deputy Mrs. Hogan O'Higgins says that Fianna Fáil have gerrymandered the constituency of Clare. Surely the answer to this is that historically Clare has always been a Fianna Fáil constituency and will, indeed, always be a Fianna Fáil constituency? At the moment it is represented for Fianna Fáil by the Minister for Labour, Deputy Dr. Hillery, Deputy Seán Ó Ceallaigh and Deputy Barrett. If possible, we would have left it intact instead of having to split it up into the constituencies of Clare and Clare-Galway. As I say, Clare has a history of voting for Fianna Fáil. It elected the President of Ireland, in the first instance, and from that time it has returned Fianna Fáil members with considerable majorities. If Fianna Fáil wanted to gerrymander surely in this instance the wise thing would have been to leave that constituency intact. Unfortunately, or fortunately as the case may be, this Bill had to be introduced and the constituencies had to be revised.

I do not intend to indulge in self-interest in this debate, but there is one matter in the Bill which worries me in relation to the constituency I represent, the constituency of Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown. First of all, may I say that a considerable part of what I would consider to be my support has been taken away from me? The townlands of Dundrum, Mount Merrion, Goatstown, Clonskea, Milltown—indeed, Milltown, where I hold a monthly clinic—all these have been taken away from the constituency of Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown. I should like to take this opportunity of thanking the people for the considerable support they have given Fianna Fáil over the years in those areas. I am sorry I will not be their representative in the next election. Of course, I hope I will succeed again in the revised constituency of Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown, but I would urge the people in those areas to support the Fianna Fáil candidates who will be on offer at the next general election. I know very well the people who will be elected there for Fianna Fáil, whoever they may be, will give as good service as they have been getting to date. That does not sound very humble, but it is a personal point of view, as all opinions are personal.

In relation to the division of the constituency, the map in the Library which is available to Deputies shows a line going from Leopardstown Racecourse right up to Ballybrack, and then suddenly shooting down again to take in Shankill and Rathmichael. I would ask the Minister to straighten out that line from Leopardstown Racecourse to Shankill. This is the complete answer. It gives a coherence to the constituency. It makes it physically practicable to get around and I think the Deputies in the constituency, those representing Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, would like this line to be straightened out. There is undoubtedly a bend in it which, in my opinion, is unnecessary. The Minister could take a part of Rathmichael and a part of Shankill out of this constituency to solve the problem of balancing the population. I can foresee no difficulty for the Minister in that respect, and I would urge him to have another look at the map which is available to Deputies in the Dáil Library. Indeed, for historical reasons he might revise the map itself because in many ways it would appear to be out of date, in the sense that it does not deal particularly with new areas in the constituency, but I have no doubt that in time the map will be brought up to date.

One matter which seems to have dogged this debate is the element of self-interest introduced by the Opposition Parties as to how representation of the constituencies will affect them personally; in other words this Bill has been reduced by the Opposition to a personal level. This is, I think, a matter of some importance. No Deputy worth his salt would have any fear about putting his name before the people in any given area. Party politics are moving away from the arena of personalities into the area of Party policies. Policies rather than personalities are what the people want today and they will follow the policy of a Party they consider good. Discussing this Bill in terms of self-interest is very wrong. Any candidate offering himself to the people should be prepared to take what is coming to him whether he be elected or defeated.

The debate has been one long litany of self-interest in the case of the Opposition Party and I should like to remind them that it is the people who decide these issues and that coming here to shed crocodile tears merely indicates their own little area of self-interest. "Shall I or shall I not be elected the next time?"— that is apparently the question they are discussing. Can anybody in the House, particularly from city or suburban constituencies, say with certainty where his votes come from? Can he go along a street in suburbia and say: "That is Deputy Andrews' side of the street; that is Deputy Cosgrave's side; that is Deputy Booth's street and that is Deputy Dockrell's"? Alternatively, can he go along and say that houses numbers 1 to 10 are Andrews' street——

(Interruptions.)

Mr. Andrews

I am sure that when I am dead and buried the people of Dún Laoghaire will erect some sort of monument to me and, if not, perhaps they will consider calling a street after me. Can one say with certainty that No. 1 is Andrews', No. 2 Cosgrave's, No. 3 Andrews', No. 4 Dockrell's and No. 5 Booth's? One cannot do that any more. City and suburban people and, I have no doubt, rural people are becoming far more sophisticated than those who voted traditionally for a Party out of loyalty to that Party. The new generation is more concerned with policies than with personalities. We are moving into an arena of sophistication in politics. With the coverage given to politics by RTE, the newspapers and various journals people are becoming far more aware and this is a very good thing. Communication has been lax over the years but now, with more modern media, people know and understand issues which are put clearly before them. In saying this I do not intend in any way to denigrate those people who have voted from the establishment of the State up to five, six or seven years ago. They had their own views and their own ways of formulating their opinions but people nowadays are becoming more aware.

I have here some rather interesting statistics. There have been four revisions of constituencies before this: this will be the fifth. There was a revision of constituencies before the election on the 9th June, 1927. The second revision was before the election of the 1st July, 1937, the third in 1948 and the fourth before the election of the 4th October, 1961. I am not in a position to announce to the House when the next general election will be but it will be held after the fifth revision of the constituencies. The number of TDs defeated in the election of the 9th June, 1927 was 43. The number who did not contest the election was 30. The number of TDs defeated in the election of the 1st July, 1937 was 31 and the number who did not offer themselves for election was 16. After the fourth revision of the constituencies in the election of the 4th October, 1961 the number defeated was 11 and the number of TDs who did not contest the election was 15. The average turnover of Deputies in 16 general elections only four of which followed revision of constituencies, was 33.

Mr. Coughlan

What about 1947?

Mr. Andrews

I should like to check that again. There were four revisions of constituencies and I am grateful to the Deputy for reminding me but it was not in 1947; it was in 1948. That was the third time the constituencies were revised. The number of TDs defeated was 20 and the number who did not contest the election was nine.

We are now coming to the fifth revision of the constituencies. The first revision was on the 27th August, 1923; the second on the 1st July, 1937; the third on the 4th February, 1948 and the fourth on the 4th October, 1961. This is a matter that concerns all of us but we should look at it more from the point of view of how we can serve the people rather than how they can serve us.

A certain amount of abuse has been levelled at the Minister and for the record, I want to say that from my own experience as a Deputy and as a party worker in Fianna Fáil in my townland of Dundrum for the past 16 or 17 years, the Minister for Local Government has consistently received bad press or bad publicity. This has been uninformed and unreasonable. For my part as a backbench Deputy of the Party I can say that the Minister, Deputy Boland, is a man who is available to backbench Deputies and I have no doubt available to all Deputies in the House. One has just to mention a problem to him in relation to a residents' association anxious to meet the Minister for Local Government and give him a day's notice and you can come in and line up behind a large queue of people waiting to see him. He is an extremely hard-working and dedicated Minister and a man of integrity. It comes ill from certain Deputies to level at him the type of abuse that has been forthcoming from them.

Personally, I want to thank the Minister for what he has done for the constituency I represent. He is going into the new constituency of South County Dublin and I have no doubt he will receive the same support as I received there. I wish him the very best of luck in these areas of Milltown, parts of Dundrum, Goatstown, Mount Merrion and Clonskeagh.

Mr. L. Belton

I believe that the Minister in his approach to the redistribution of constituencies tried to achieve what he had failed to achieve in the recent referendum. He set out, in so far as it was in his power to do so, to nullify the wishes of the people which were so clearly expressed in the referendum.

The people gave their verdict in no uncertain manner and even the most ardent Fianna Fáil Members of this House stated that they were glad that there had been a very clear-cut decision and that there was no ambiguity about the result. The people had spoken and spoken clearly and loudly to the effect that they wished to retain the PR system of election. The Taoiseach himself said that the lesson of the referendum would not be lost.

I am sure everybody knows—and it has long been agreed by all Members of this House—that PR worked at its best in larger constituencies; the larger the constituency, the better PR is seen to work. The Government should realise even at this late hour how foolish and stupid they are in trying to alter the system. They should accept the lesson they have learned and agree to abide by the wishes of the people. The wish of the people is that PR be retained but the Minister, in the revision of the constituencies, has adopted the opposite attitude.

In the explanatory memorandum we see that in 1961 there were 17 three-seat constituencies and, under the new Bill, the Minister proposes to have no fewer than 26 such constituencies. In other words, he has created more small constituencies and this is in direct contrast with what the people expressed in the referendum. We had 12 four-seat constituencies in 1961 but, under the new Bill, there will be 14 and, of course, as regards five-seat constituencies in which PR works very effectively, the Minister is reducing these from nine to two under the new system.

However, the Minister was careful to pick and choose the different areas in which he will make three-seat and four-seat constituencies. All along the western coast, from Donegal to Kerry where he knows that as yet Labour have not been very strong and the issue has mainly been between Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil, the Minister is hoping, with a small majority in these three-seat areas, to get two out of three. That is the sole purpose of having three-seat constituencies in that area.

In Dublin, where Fianna Fáil know that in a three-seat constituency it is practically a foregone conclusion that the three seats would divide 1-1-1 — Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and Labour —they are hoping that they will be able to get two out of four in the four-seat areas. Two out of four is much better for them than one out of three. In the five-seat constituencies in Dublin, Fianna Fáil hope only to get two out of five; they could not hope to get three out of five, hence, the Minister is reducing those five-seat areas and making them four-seat ones.

Prior to the last local elections when the Minister revised the local authority areas, it was accepted here by all Parties, Fianna Fáil as well as Fine Gael and Labour, that the decision to divide North Dublin and South Dublin by the Liffey was a very wise one. Part of the No. 9 local authority area embraced part of the north side of the Liffey but then the Minister decided that this would no longer be the case. Members of all Parties seemed satisfied that the north and south sides were clearly divided by the Liffey. In this Bill, however, the Minister is re-introducing that. He is now creating a constituency of Dublin Central.

Mr. Boland

Perhaps the Deputy would tell me how I could have avoided doing this?

Mr. L. Belton

I shall not go into detailed figures.

Mr. Boland

I was thinking so but I do not wish to interrupt the Deputy.

Mr. L. Belton

The Minister could have avoided this.

Mr. Boland

There was no way in which this could have been avoided.

Mr. L'Estrange

There were plenty of ways.

Mr. L. Belton

The Minister has played around with Dublin North East and has part of Baldoyle into the county.

Mr. Boland

I had to do this.

Mr. L. Belton

There was no reason why the Minister could not have taken a little from the county and have 14 seats on the north side and 13 on the south side.

Mr. Boland

It could not be done.

Mr. L. Belton

Why?

Mr. Boland

The figures are not there.

Mr. L. Belton

The Minister could have given or taken a little. Three four-seat areas and a two-seater are 14 seats. He could very easily have made two five-seaters and a four-seater but this did not suit his purpose.

Mr. Boland

It could not be done.

Mr. L. Belton

The part of Dublin Central that is north of the Liffey would give enough for two seats.

Mr. Boland

This could not be done unless another seat were taken and put into part of the county.

Mr. L. Belton

The Minister could have made three four's and a three or he could have made three five's. However, this would not suit Fianna Fáil. With a very slight adjustment in Dublin where there are 13 seats on one side and 14 on the other, the Minister could, with a very slight adjustment and with Baldoyle given to the county——

Mr. Boland

I could not.

Mr. L. Belton

Why?

Mr. Boland

Because of the population

Mr. L'Estrange

The Minister had to separate the two Ministers, Deputy Haughey and Deputy Colley. It would not do to have one heading the poll, beating the other.

Mr. L. Belton

I shall not go into any details as regards County Dublin but it does seem that part of Kimmage Manor is now in County Dublin.

Mr. Boland

It is not.

Mr. L. Belton

I do not know but surely the Minister could have devised something better in County Dublin. I do not know if there is any truth in the rumour that he created North County Dublin and South County Dublin because he did not want to be in the constituency with Deputy P. J. Burke. That rumour has been going around that the Minister wanted Deputy Burke out of the constituency. However, a more daring example of the way constituencies were carved solely and entirely for the purpose of suiting Fianna Fáil is Mayo. The county of Mayo has practically the same population still, but instead of having a North and South Mayo now we will have an east and west side. Was there any advantage in changing to east and west rather than north and south? The only answer to that is that Fianna Fáil did not want to have two Ministers in the one constituency and this was a way of dividing it.

Of course, the county of Leitrim has been completely carved up. Part of it has gone to Donegal, some of it to Roscommon and some to Sligo. It no longer exists at all. The Minister took the part around Athlone and purposely put it into Roscommon in the hope that it would suit the Fianna Fáil Minister in Roscommon.

Despite the fact that Leitrim no longer exists as a political entity on the map, we see that the Taoiseach was in undue haste, within a fortnight of the death of Senator Miss Pearse, in appointing a Senator to that area. He did not wait a month before he appointed a Senator, and I do not know what was the need for this great haste.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The appointment by the Taoiseach of Senators is not relevant to this debate.

Mr. L. Belton

I only wanted to point out that we have two vacancies in the Dáil and there is no haste in filling them.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Even that could not be relevant to the debate at the present moment.

Mr. L. Belton

It may not be relevant, but it is a very live topic at the moment with people outside. The people are wide awake. They were not fooled by the propaganda of Fianna Fáil in the referendum and the people will clearly see through this attempt by the Minister to overrule and override the decision which they gave so clearly in the referendum.

Mr. L'Estrange

Hear, hear.

Mr. L. Belton

Whenever the Government think fit to go to the country the people will again give them their answer. We on this side of the House are not afraid to face the next election. We look forward to it. We know that the people will give the Fianna Fáil Government the answer they so richly deserve. The Government failed in the referendum, as I have said, and even if they try by might and main to do everything they can in this Bill to gerrymander the constituencies to safeguard themselves they are now on the run and, please God, when they go to the country the people will give them their answer good and proper.

Mr. Creed

I will be brief on this. Before the debate comes to a conclusion I should like to say a few words in so far as the revision of the constituencies is concerned. At the outset I would say that, looking at this revision from a personal point of view, I should be pleased indeed with it. I represent the constituency of Mid-Cork and I also represent Bandon/Macroom electoral area in the Cork County Council. Up to now in the old constituency the area I represent in the local authority was almost detached from the constituency I represent in Dáil Éireann and the Minister has included in that constituency now the area where I live and the town of Macroom. I agree with the Minister only on this point. This town has been changed in every revision that has come about and it should always be included in the constituency of Cork. This town is always regarded as the capital of Mid-Cork.

In so far as I am concerned, I am mature enough and have experience enough to look beyond my own door and beyond the boundaries of the constituency of Mid-Cork. The proposed new constituency, if it is not altered in this constituency revision, is almost 90 miles in length. I believe the Minister had complete disregard for distance. In the new constituency there are four outgoing Opposition Deputies. There are two Labour Deputies— Deputies McAuliffe and Mrs. Desmond —and two Fine Gael Deputies—Deputies Burton and I. This was set up for the purpose of trying to select a constituency where the two Labour Deputies would be opposed to each other and the two Fine Gael Deputies. In so far as that constituency is concerned, with regard to the two Fine Gael Deputies at least after the next election we will return two Fine Gael TDs in that constituency.

I will not deal with the gerrymandering in the city of Dublin as I do not know enough about that but as far as Cork county is concerned—I am sure Deputy Crowley will agree with me—and particularly the constituency of Mid-Cork, you have an area in Mid-Cork where Kinsale is almost in the centre of the county and you have Kinsale town in the new constituency of West Cork and Pearson's Bridge at the entrance to Bantry which is near the west of Cork. This does not make sense. You have the constituency extending from Newtownshandrom and Charleville right across to Crosshaven. In the old constituency I represent there are two different housing areas, the southern Cork housing area and the northern housing area as well. I felt the people I represent were at a disadvantage. People who came to me in connection with problems would be dealt with by the Northern Housing Committee of which I was not a member. The only way I can make representations on their behalf is by letter or telephone. If I am returned to the Dáil in the new constituency, which is divided between three housing areas and three health authorities as well, I can see a difficulty.

The last speaker said that the recently-held referendum showed in no uncertain terms that the people wanted to hold on to the system of PR. I will not refer to the referendum beyond saying that the people figured that the PR system had served them well and that it was a most democratic system. If we are honest—and surely the Minister for Local Government is honest?—we must agree that it is an established fact that if proportional representation is to be used effectively it can be used to greatest effect in five- or six-seat constituencies rather than in a three-seat constituency.

Particularly along the western seaboard, all the constituencies there are three-seat constituencies. The Minister for Local Government is hoping, I suppose, that, with 51 per cent of the vote cast in those three-seat constituencies, Fianna Fáil can gain two out of the three seats. The referendum proved that the political tide has turned against the Government. Their hope now is that gerrymandering of constituencies will modify the trend. I know perfectly well that this will not be so and that the people, having in no uncertain way given their answer in the referendum, will certainly give them their answer again whether there are three-seat, four-seat or five-seat constituencies.

There are many counties such as County Leitrim that have been completely mutilated. I admit that it is probably a difficult job to divide the constituencies and that, no matter what way they are divided, somebody is likely to complain but I cannot see any reason why a county like Leitrim should be divided between three counties. Look at the constituency of Galway-Clare, where a part of Clare had to go into Galway. The Minister for Local Government will be known as the great exterminator of county and constituency boundaries.

Let me come back again to the constituency of mid-Cork. In the recent referendum. I had in my possession from the Fianna Fáil director of elections in that constituency, a printed pamphlet signed by Deputy Tom Meaney, Director of Elections in the northern area of Millstreet, Knocknagree and Boherbue. Leaflets were handed out to the effect that, if the people in that area voted "No" then that area would go into Kerry in the revision of constituencies. I refer to this because that very Deputy, when he spoke here this evening on this very Bill, stated that the Fine Gael Party were threatening and spreading false propaganda in the referendum in order to intimidate and force people into voting "No." The people have voted "No" and have held on to the system of proportional representation.

Mr. Barry

The Government were defeated by a majority of a quarter of a million votes.

Mr. Creed

Yes. The Minister for Local Government has now decided that, because they voted in such an overwhelming majority to retain the system of proportional representation, he will set up three-seat constituencies as far as he is able to do so in order that the people will not be able to use effectively the system of proportional representation. Deputy Andrews, a while ago——

Mr. Meaney

The old mid-Cork represented three different health areas.

Mr. Creed

They are interested in self preservation and, as far as we are concerned here on this side of the House, we know perfectly well that, whatever constituencies there may be when the next general election comes, the people will give their answer to Fianna Fáil as they did in the recent referendum.

Mr. Crowley

Nonsense.

Mr. Geoghegan

Rubbish.

Mr. L'Estrange

No Party since the foundation of the State ever sustained such a humiliating defeat.

Mr. P. Byrne

When the Minister comes to reply to this debate, it will be most interesting to hear his reply to the charge by Deputy T. J. Fitzpatrick of Cavan that it is quite illogical, even dishonourable, for a person in his position, who did all that one man could do to overthrow the system of proportional representation, to come now into this House with an Electoral (Amendment) Bill which purports to reorganise the operation of the system. Deputy Fitzpatrick points out most significantly that the Minister breached the normal and sensible convention of this House that a Minister, when introducing a Bill, recommends the Bill to the House. It is quite clear that, having been thwarted by a substantial majority in the referendum, the Minister is now doing what he can—indeed, it is not very much but it is enough to warrant a protest—to make the system of proportional representation inoperable.

In the course of the many interesting television presentations—"Seven Days" and other programmes— during the referendum campaign, the programme which gave us the history of proportional representation established very significantly that those who propounded the system visualised large constituencies because the system of proportional representation comes into play to full effect in large constituencies.

Indeed, it is very interesting to recall something which many Members of the Oireachtas may overlook. In the early days of this State, when we were filled with enthusiasm for proportional representation as the fairest system, large constituencies were the rule rather than the exception. In the election for the Seanad fought on the universal franchise in the 1920's, the whole country was a single constituency. It might not have been very practicable and it did not work, it is true, but, nevertheless, the fact that this development took place establishes that those concerned with proportional representation at the time were anxious to operate it in large constituencies. Indeed, for many years, up to the first Fianna Fáil gerrymander in the 1930's, we had constituencies of seven members and nine members in Dublin city—the whole of North Dublin as one constituency and the whole of South Dublin as another. Now, we have a reduction in the number of five-member constituencies from nine to two and we have an increase of nine in the number of threemember constituencies, in the hope that Fianna Fáil will obtain two out of three seats, thwarting, as I have said, the principle of proportional representation.

As a Dublin Deputy, I resent very much the line taken by the Minister and the Tánaiste in endeavouring to promote friction and ill-will between the west of Ireland and Dublin city in the allegations made in the course of this debate. If the population of the west has declined from the point of view of the principle of one man one vote, which the Government did their best to overthrow, that is not the fault of my constituents in Dublin NorthEast or the fault of any other voters in Dublin.

Deputies

Hear, hear.

Mr. P. Byrne

And we throw back in the Government's face the charge that this is the case.

Mr. Geoghegan

The Deputy was elected without the quota in the last election, was he not?

Mr. P. Byrne

So what? I am here and that is what counts. That is what Deputies opposite resent.

Debate adjourned.