asked the Minister for the Environment the steps being taken to ensure that postal voting facilities will be available to disabled persons in the next general election which has to be held within the next 12 months.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Postal Voting Facilities for Disabled Persons.
15.
Legislation to provide for special voting facilities for disabled electors is being drafted. The Bill will be brought before the House shortly and it is hoped to have it enacted in the present Dáil session.
Will that be in time for the general election?
The answer to Deputy Burke's question is yes.
Next week we expect that amendment.
The Deputies opposite have expected it every week.
This question was asked just 12 months ago and at that time Deputy De Rossa was informed that legislation was in preparation. I am glad to hear the Minister's reply. I presume he is aware that the new draft register is being prepared at the moment and will be on display in about a month or five weeks' time. That is the register that will be in force when the next election is held, if it is after April. Can the Minister assure us that the legislation will be introduced in time to enable disabled persons to be on the register for postal voting, the one which will be prepared for April 1987?
In the likelihood that the next general election is fought on the basis of that register which is at present being prepared and will come into force in April next, assuming that there is co-operation within the House, I think it would be possible to identify the people who will be eligible for postal voting on that register. I hope that, if the draftsman provides the Bill in time — I know that the Opposition parties have indicated their support for the measure and I assume that it will not be held too long in the House — it might be possible to prepare work in that regard as soon as the Bill is enacted. The Deputy referred to the fact that his colleague received a rather similar reply 12 months ago. The reason for the delay is that as a result of an examination of the practices that had occurred during the postal voting provisions in the local elections of 1985 an entire revision and recasting of the proposals had to be carried out. I was going to say to the Deputy that some of the things that have happened would make the hair stand on your head.
The Minister should not insult Deputy Mac Giolla like that.
It was as a result of that that the present proposals have now been prepared. I will expand on that for the House when the Bill comes before it in the next few weeks.
I would like——
We are not going to have a debate on this.
I know it is a matter of supreme indifference to you, a Cheann Comhairle, as you are the only one guaranteed re-election to this House. The rest of us mere mortals have to stand before the people.
I still take an interest in these things.
While the Minister is quite confident that the election will not be held until the new register comes in, I ask him to allow his imagination to run a little and to face the possibility of an election before the new register is prepared. When the legislation is passed will it be drafted in such a way that the postal voting facilities can be allowed and will operate for people on the present register?
You cannot anticipate a discussion on a Bill that is not before the House.
I am not anticipating a discussion. I want reassurance from the Minister that the present register can be operated.
I am not sure whether the Deputy is anticipating the Bill or an election. I think it would be possible to operate from the present register. I know that the Ceann Comhairle will discipline me if I appear to be anticipating what is in the legislation. The House will appreciate that under any system that might be introduced there would be a period necessary when the person who would be potentially eligible as a disabled person for postal voting facilities would make application and produce proof of their disability. The administrative time taken in allowing for a scheme to be advertised and applications to be made and verified would need to be taken into account also. It is merely because of my uncertainty as to the administrative length of time that I cannot give a categorical answer to the Deputy. The answer that I can give with best certainty and that ought to relieve the minds of Deputies opposite is that I expect that this procedure will be prepared and will come into operation for the first time in conjunction with the register that will come into force on 14 April next.