The Prevention of Electoral Abuses Bill of which I now move the Second Reading codifies the existing law with certain alterations and changes in relation to the prevention of corrupt practices. In the law as it stands at present are embodied sections of quite a number of Acts, such as the Representation of the People Act, 1850, the Corrupt Practices Act, 1854, the Ballot Act, 1872, the Corrupt and Illegal Practices Prevention Act, 1883, the Parliamentary Election Corrupt Practices Act, 1885, the Corrupt and Illegal Practices Prevention Act, 1895, and the Representation of the People Act, 1918. Besides codifying the law, certain changes that the experiences we have had in this country have shown to be necessary, are being made. There are new penalties for personation and new powers are given for arrest, and for other steps for the prevention of personation. Heretofore a police officer could only take a person in charge for personation if he were directed to do so by the Presiding Officer. Under this Bill it is proposed to give him power to act in the same way as he would in the case of any other offence against the law being committed. It is proposed, therefore, to indemnify the Returning Officer and policeman in case he acts without malice. Of course if there is malice proven, or if there is anything else wrong in that way the indemnity would not hold. The matter of personation has been regarded as almost a sort of legitimate practice in the past. Both sides have caused men personating to be arrested, and then there was a sort of exchange of prisoners at the end of the day, and the offenders on both sides were released. The thing continued in that way, and at the next election these people probably felt there was no danger in impersonating and they were quite ready to do it. Personation has become a habit, and it is a matter that it is very necessary to take such steps as we can to put an end to it. We also propose to provide that the offence of personation can be dealt with summarily. It is one of the things for which it is very difficult to secure a conviction if tried before a jury, and it would be more difficult if during the next few months people were brought before juries on charges of personation. There will be certainly a great likelihood that in any jury that might be empannelled there will be somebody who had been guilty of the practice himself. We feel it is even more important to have a certainty of conviction if there is evidence given that proves the case and that there should be a conviction rather than that the punishment should be very severe. If a man gets five or six months imprisonment it will serve to deter him quite as well from practising offences of this sort as if he got a much longer term. It is a matter in which people should feel that the risk of being detected and punished for it is very considerable. We have had to make provision in this Bill for the carrying out of a Referendum. It might be argued that there is no need for personating agents at a Referendum. I think in very many countries where the institution of the Referendum exists there is nothing in the way of personating agents appointed, but in view of recent practices we feel that some provision should be made that would allow machinery to be set up to detect and prevent personation. No sort of State machinery can be set up. If you take your Presiding Officer he will not do anything, ordinarily speaking, to prevent personation. The Presiding Officer is a man from the locality generally; he is paid a certain fee for acting for the day. He is not going to do anything in the ordinary way that will incur odium if he can avoid doing it, and any amount of personation might go on, and the Presiding Officer might certainly take no steps to stop it. He would allow it to go on. You cannot appoint from the State personating agents either, because you would be in the same difficulty. A man employed in four years for a day is not going for the sake of the fee he gets or the hope of being employed again, to offend his neighbour or to take any strong action.
If agents were appointed and paid by the State the money would be spent without result. We have provided machinery in this Bill which we think will enable political parties to be brought into action. There can be appointed, if a Referendum is demanded, a man who will challenge the Bill. He will have power to get personating agents to attend in the booths and to stop people who are endeavouring to personate. On the other hand, if the Bill is passed— as it must be passed by the Dáil before there is a Referendum—there can be appointed somebody who will act as sponsor, who will appoint somebody as agent in each county who will have power to send people to act in the booths in case personation is attempted. The machinery is not perfect, but it seems the best that can be devised. This work that may be done by political parties in furtherance of their own politics, with a view either to have the Bill carried or defeated, seems to be the best that can be accomplished. It certainly does seem necessary, in view of the extent to which personation has been carried on in recent years.
Certain other changes have been made. For instance, in the past, it was illegal to hire cars for elections. Of course, cars were continually hired and the prohibition was rather in the nature of a farce. Then it was illegal to make payments for bands, ribbons, etc. It does not seem that there is any real objection to spending money on them, and in any case money was always spent in that way. We have withdrawn the limit of expenditure that a candidate may incur. It was very difficult to fix upon a limit that would be suitable in the present circumstances, with Proportional Representation. The limit which might be reasonable in a three-member constituency might be inadequate in a nine-member constituency, where there would be a large number of booths scattered all over the constituency. On the other hand, if you allowed the sum that would be reasonable for a nine-member constituency, it would be too much for a candidate who would seek support in a more restricted area. There is also the fact that the law was entirely ignored in this matter. The agents habitually made returns showing an expenditure of a few hundred pounds, whereas, the expenditure really amounted to £1,400, or £1,500. It seems to me to be better simply to insist on a return being made and to hope that in the future we shall have accurate returns—a thing that was not done in the past. In that way we could come down on people who expended money in a way that was forbidden in the Act, and we would not trouble at all so much about the entire amount of money spent. It is doubtful whether expenditure on the part of any candidate would be likely to influence the result in the same way that it might have done in the past, when there was a straight fight between two candidates. Those are matters that are new and that are capable of being improved.
There is not much new in principle in the Bill. It is mainly a codification of the existing law. The changes are chiefly changes of detail, and it seems to me that a good deal of attention might be given to the consideration of the clauses in Committee, but as the general principle of the Bill is one about which there cannot be a great deal of difference of opinion, I move the Second Reading of the Bill.
