The Opposition's only hope is to create sufficient confusion in the public mind to prevent the public knowing the full facts. On the other hand, we believe we can make these things known to the people. We believe the people will see the advantages that will accrue to the country as a result of what we propose.
This proposed electoral reform will, in fact, be effected by the people. I suggest Deputy Norton has done no more than express his opinion. He has not shown that the people will not accept what we are asking them to accept. In fact, there does not seem to be any way of discovering this except by means of the referendum. Neither has Deputy Norton shown that the acceptance of his amendment, which involves the retention of discrimination in regard to voting power with even less justification than in present circumstances, will in any way lessen the opposition to the fundamental change from multi-member constituencies to single-member constituencies. I confess I do not see any way in which he could show this and it appears to me, therefore, that there has been no substantial reason advanced as to why this proposed amendment should be adopted.
Deputy Norton admits that the system we propose is more desirable, but he believes that the system he proposes would be more expedient, though he has failed to establish his argument in that regard. I said on the Second Reading debate that since neither our own Ard Fheis nor the Committee on the Constitution nor any other body recommended any other system of voting in single-member constituencies, we naturally put forward what we considered to be the best and only justifiable system. Since this alternative system has been proposed, even if it is only on the basis of expediency, it is necessary, I think, to show just how unjustifiable is this ridiculous system of considering some people's preferences to the nth degree as votes for different candidates while ignoring all but the first preference votes of others. There is no way of dealing equitably and democratically with all voters other than the way we propose.
The transferable vote, fraudulently and cynically misnamed the single transferable vote, since so far from being a single vote it is essentially a system of discriminatory multiple voting, discriminates arbitrarily between voters. I go further; I say that the basis on which this discrimination is exercised is opposed to the fundamental concept of democracy. The whole theory of democracy is based on the principle that the majority is right. It assumes that all the people over a certain age are qualified to vote, that their votes are entitled to equal consideration and the views of the majority should prevail. If that is so, and if the majority view is the correct democratic view, then it follows surely that the views of the smallest minority are least worthy of consideration. As I said, the fundamental point is that all views be given the same consideration but, even if the proposition that there should be differential voting for some were to be accepted, surely it would be to the largest group that this differential voting should be accorded rather than to the smallest group.
The transferable vote works in the exact opposite way. It is devised to arrange the maximum possible consideration of the views of the smallest minority down to the point of treating an expression of opinion that a particular candidate is the second worst of the total number on offer as equivalent to the majority opinion that a particular candidate is the best while, at the same time, arranging that the minimum amount of consideration will be accorded to the views of those who find a reasonable number of their fellow-constituents to agree with their views. The system arranges that in a close result the decision as to who is to represent the constituency and therefore ultimately what Party is to form the Government of the country will be made, not as is inherent in democracy, by the majority, but by the smallest minority group in the constituency.
I want to suggest that this proposition for the retention of the present system of multiple voting for those who are most out of tune with the majority view needs some explanation. Under the system of the transferable vote, the number of votes given to the individual voter is, in general, proportional to the smallness of the number of voters who share the voter's particular view. In other words, the more out of tune a voter is with a political view shared with a reasonable number of the electorate, the greater the number of actual votes that are given to him, that is to say, that the smaller the number of people who share a person's view the more votes he gets and these are all treated as full votes, the same as the single vote of the majority group.
It is bad enough to give one vote to some people and an indefinite number to others, the total number given being controlled only by the number of candidates in the field, but it is worse to give the multiple votes to those who can find the least to agree with them and can therefore be described in the immortal words of Deputy Dillon as "cranks and crackpots".
Apart from anything else, the transferable vote system is a fraud. It purports to establish that there is a majority in favour of one candidate after the people in the ballot box have said that there is not. The transferable vote system manipulates votes after they have been cast, in accordance with a set of illogical, inconsistent and unjustifiable rules and, as a result, allocates votes that were cast for a number of different candidates eventually to two of the candidates and the absurd claim is then made that this post-election manipulation of the people's votes establishes that an absolute majority favour whichever candidate winds up with a majority, consisting of votes that were cast for himself and a number of votes that were cast for other people but which were allocated to him by virtue of the machinations of the returning officer and his staff.
This is nonsense. It is a fraudulent claim even if you accept the basis of the absurd principle of all these preference votes being of equal value to actual votes and it can only be arrived at as a result of the most blatant and undemocratic discrimination between voters. What is claimed as the "result" arrived at in this way can be easily proved to be unsustainable if the principle of equal treatment for all voters is conceded, that is, if it is agreed that the principle of one man one vote is a proper principle to adhere to. Both on Second Reading a couple of weeks ago and in the debate in 1959 I gave an example which showed that this is so, which showed that this system does not do what it claims to do, even on the basis of this ridiculous assumption of equating preference votes of any degree to actual votes, and this has not been controverted nor has any attempt been made to controvert it because it clearly shows the fraudulence of the claims made and the absurdity of the whole basis of the system.
I think it is necessary to give an example again although I fully appreciate that, once again, the answer will be silence. I quoted an example of three candidates contesting a single-member constituency or contesting a by-election under the present circumstances or contesting the concluding stages of the count in a multi-member constituency. One candidate, candidate A, has 4,000 votes; candidate B has 3,500 votes and candidate C has 3,000 votes. The operation of this system of transferable votes is to take the 3,000 votes cast for the candidate who is in the smallest minority—candidate C—and distribute them among the other two remaining candidates on the basis of equating second preference, or whatever other preferences there may be, to actual votes and this could result in 1,000 of these being allocated to candidate A, giving him 5,000, and 3,000 to candidate B, giving him 5,500 votes.
The proponents of this so-called theory of the transferable vote say that this is grand; that it has now been established that a majority of the people in that constituency want candidate B to be elected. That is a ridiculous claim. It is obviously not true because no such thing has, in fact, been established. What has happened is that of the 10,500 people here, 3,000 of them who voted for candidate C have been given two votes and those who voted for the other candidate have been given one vote only. For what reason? How were they selected for this favoured treatment? Just because they failed to elect their candidate? But, now, as a result of giving this smallest group this specially favoured treatment, we arrive at a situation where the major group in the constituency have also failed to elect their candidate. Why should the 4,000 who voted for candidate A not get the same consideration allocated to their views, not get the same voting power as the 3,000 who voted for candidate C?
What I should like some member of the Opposition Parties who want to retain this system to explain is, how do people disqualify themselves from getting the same treatment with regard to their votes merely because of the fact that they find more people to agree with their views than do these other people who found themselves in the smallest minority? I say that there is no reason whatever why the 4,000 who have been put in the position of voting for a candidate who is not successful should not get the same treatment as the 3,000 who voted for candidate C in this instance, and it is obvious that if we decide to treat all these voters equally, as is inherent in the principle of one man one vote, the 4,000 votes distributed in the same way, on the same basis as the 3,000 were, could go, 1,500 to candidate B, giving him 5,000, and 2,500 to candidate C, giving him 5,500, and now as a result of giving the 4,000 the same treatment as the 3,000, we have the result of establishing that a majority in the constituency are in favour of candidate B and candidate C. It might be said that what has been established is that more people wanted B than A and more people wanted C than B and that therefore the second result would be the proper one. But this has not been established either, because we now have the position where the 3,500 who voted for candidate B have been treated in a discriminatory way and they have not had the same consideration accorded to their views as was given to the views of the other voters. I submit there is no way in which they either have disqualified themselves or have proved themselves to deserve to be treated as second-class citizens.
Of course, it is obviously possible if those votes were distributed they could give us yet another result—that 1,500 could be allocated to A and the remaining 2,000 to C, giving us yet another result of 5,500 in favour of A and 5,000 in favour of C. So that it is quite possible that if every voter were treated the same, we would arrive at the conclusion that there is a majority in the constituency in favour of each of the three candidates. That, of course, is nonsense. But you get a nonsensical result because the whole operation is based on the nonsensical assumption that a preference vote, no matter how low the preference it indicates, is the same thing and is worthy of the same treatment as a No. 1 vote.
This is the basic fallacy involved in the system. It may be said the first result would be the result if there were only two candidates, A and B, in the constituency and that the second would be the position if there were only B and C and the third if there were only A and C. But in fact that was not the position. There were three candidates in the constituency. Each was entitled to stand. People were asked to choose between them and they did and this is a system of trying to disprove what the people said in the ballot boxes. The result showed that there was not an absolute majority in favour of any of the three and it is futile to try to establish that there was.
I claim it is a fundamental thing that all voters should be treated the same, that the principle should be: one man, one vote. Everybody gets one vote. If some people are to get two votes, everybody should get two. If some are to get three, everybody should get three. If all are treated in the same way on the basis of this nonsensical assumption of the nth preference vote being equivalent to a No. 1 vote, we are likely to get a nonsensical result. There is only the one way of treating everybody's vote the same, that is, count the votes and accept the result as the people expressed it.
It might be suggested that everybody should get equal treatment by allocating a notional value to preference votes, totalling these up for every candidate and allocating the seat to the highest scorer. Any such national value would of course be purely arbitrary and the people would soon see that the most effective way of supporting their candidate would be just to vote for that candidate and for that candidate only. It is quite clear the only feasible and democratic thing to do at an election is to ask the people to indicate the candidate and policy they prefer and to count the votes. It is certainly the only equitable way of choosing between a number of candidates. Numbers 2, 3, 4, and second last preferences all mean different things. In fact, they mean different things to different people. I do not know whether the Deputies opposite would like to maintain that a No. 1 vote for Fine Gael and a No. 2 vote for Labour means "I believe in private enterprise" and "I also advocate the taking over of Guinness's, Jacob's, Pierce's of Wexford and Waterford Glass", as the vice-chairman of the Labour Party recently announced on television as Labour Party policy.
In the example I have quoted, all we know is that 4,000 people voted for A, 3,500 for B and 3,000 for C. It is not possible to establish that the position is different from that. If there is an absolute majority in favour of one in a constituency, the people will say so as they did in West Limerick and Clare. If the people have already said there is not an absolute majority, there is no way of establishing that there is.
There has been a lot of talk about by-elections, and as the winners of six out of seven by-elections this is a subject naturally very dear to our hearts. I admit I would like to go into them all in detail. There is a certain satisfaction in contemplating pleasant things, such as six victories out of seven. But although by-elections under the present system have particular relevance to the proposal of the transferable vote in single-member constituencies I do not propose to discuss the whole seven.
There has been particular reference by the Opposition Parties to the Wicklow and East Limerick by-elections, which are two out of the three which have been contested since the re-crystallisation of the Coalition brought about by our proposal to amend the Constitution in regard to the electoral system. This appears to have had one good effect already in exposing the continued existence of the Coalition and bringing it into the open inasmuch as these by-elections since then have consisted of a full-scale Coalition effort to direct the voters on how to transfer their votes. One of these all-out Coalition campaigns resulted in a seat for Fianna Fáil, despite the combined efforts of the Party machines of the two Opposition Parties, while the other produced the one swallow that makes the Opposition's summer. The result of these by-elections and the manipulations of the people's votes in the elections on these two occasions in themselves showed the absurdities, the discrimination and indeed the blatant fraud of the transferable vote system.
In order to demonstrate that and to demonstrate the lack of justification for this whole theory of the transferring of votes, I would like to consider the Wicklow by-election results first. As Deputies know, in this constituency the Coalition strategy was a five against one line-up. The result of the first count was that a Sinn Féin candidate received 2,009 votes, a Labour candidate 5,761, a Liberal candidate 509, a Fianna Fáil candidate 9,788, an Independent 191 and a Fine Gael candidate 8,035. The result of the application of the transferable vote rules was that the candidate who was supported by 8,035 of the voters was deemed to be elected, and "deemed" is the right word as he certainly was not elected by the people. There were 8,035 of the voters who voted for this candidate who was "deemed" to be elected and there were 18,258 who voted for candidates who were not "deemed" to be elected. Of those 18,258, 8,470 had their preference votes treated as No. 1's. There is no way of knowing how many second preferences were treated as No. 1's or how many third, fourth or fifth but, in fact, we do know that some people had all these preferences in turn being treated as actual votes for candidates other than the candidates for whom the voters actually voted— 8,470 of the 18,258 who voted for candidates who were not "deemed" to be elected.
The 9,788 who found most people in the constituency to agree with their views did not get this consideration. What I want somebody to explain to me is why were they deemed as having disqualified themselves from getting the same treatment, the same consideration paid to their views, as, for instance, the 191 who voted for the Independent candidate and all those others who voted for other candidates who were not "deemed" to be elected? What in fact, distinguished the 9,788 from the 8,470 who were given the special consideration? The only thing that distinguished them was that they found more people to agree with their views in the constituency than any of those other 8,470. They obviously should get the same treatment. If we are to pay any attention whatever to the principles of democracy, it is, if anything these people's views who are most entitled to consideration. Why were some of these 191, for instance, given two votes, some given three votes, some given four votes and some actually given five votes while some of the 509 who voted for the Liberal candidate were given two, three and some four.
The same thing applies to the 2,009 who voted for the Sinn Féin candidate and the 5,761 who voted for the Labour candidate. The last group only got two votes but we do not know how many of these votes which were allocated to other candidates were second, third or fourth or fifth preferences. I maintain that there is no reason why the 9,788 should be treated as second-class citizens and should be given only one vote as against multiple votes given to the other smaller groups. I maintain they did not demonstrate themselves in any way as being less entitled to consideration than anybody else in the constituency, and the only thing that marked them out was that they had views that were acceptable to more of their fellow citizens than any of these other groups.
The result of this practice of discrimination in accordance with arbitrary and undemocratic rules was that the candidate who came second in the actual voting was "deemed" to be elected and this came about on the basis of treating a total of 4,561 preference votes, including an unknown number of fifth, fourth, third and second preference votes, as actual votes for this candidate whom they were not cast for. The theory is that failure to elect a candidate requires the voters' preferences to be taken into account but this result shows how these arbitrary rules discriminate against the majority group. It was not possible within this system to arrange that the candidate who got 191 votes or the candidate who got 509 or 2,009 or 5,761 votes would be elected.
After going through five operations, however, it was found possible to arrange for the defeat of the candidate who got the biggest number of voters to support him—9,788. I would say that even having arrived at that stage there was still, even based on the theory of this system, a democratic requirement to arrange that these people who voted for the candidate getting the major support in the constituency should have the same consideration paid to their votes as was paid to others whose selected candidates were "deemed" not to be elected. After all, some of these other voters had five, some had four, some had three and some had two votes. The least the majority group should expect is that they would be given a second chance at least.
It is incumbent on the people who are trying to hang on to this theory to explain what sin against democracy these voters committed. The discrimination was not only against this majority group but also even against the supporters of the minority groups who were so misguided that even on their second or third attempt they chose the same candidate as the majority. For example, of the 191 who voted for the candidate getting the smallest support, those who chose as their second candidate the man who got 509 votes, got another vote, and if their third choice went to the third last candidate, they got another and if their fourth choice went to the fourth last candidate placed they got a fifth vote. If at any stage in this manipulation of the voting any of these people transferred their vote to the candidate getting the majority of votes in the constituency they were disqualified from further consideration the same as those who supported this candidate in the first instance.
The system is based on the peculiar assumption that the major consideration in down-grading the voting power of an individual is to be in agreement with a substantial number of his fellow citizens. We disagree with this. We maintain that it is implicit in democracy that every voter should get the same treatment and that it is unjust and undemocratic—if these terms are not synonymous—to refuse the same consideration to the 9,788 as was given to the 8,470 since both of these groups had under the system voted for candidates other than the one who was eventually "deemed" to be elected. Fair play could only be given by going back to the position that existed after the fourth count in this particular election. At that stage the position was that the Labour candidate had "credited" to him 6,797 votes, the Fianna Fáil candidate 10,343 votes, and the Fine Gael candidate 8,728 votes. In other words, 1,036 votes cast for other candidates had been given to the Labour candidate, 639 to the Fine Gael candidate and 555 to the Fianna Fáil candidate. It is quite obvious that if the votes were dealt with in a non-discriminatory manner, the 10,343 which were at this stage "credited" to the Fianna Fáil candidate could have and almost certainly would have put the Labour candidate above the Fine Gael candidate. Therefore it is clear that if the votes were dealt with in a non-discriminatory way it would have been established there was a majority for at least two of the candidates.
In those circumstances, of course, the votes which were now credited to the Fine Gael candidate would be entitled to the same treatment and that might well have resulted in the same situation as that created in East Limerick. It is absolutely certain that if in the case of the Wicklow by-election, the application even of this principle of the transferable vote, which equates preference votes to acutal votes were applied in a non-discriminatory way and a fair way, it would have shown a majority for at least two and possibly three of the candidates and this, as I have said, is of course absurd and it arises because the original assumption is an absurd one.
It is clear that the only thing known about the wishes of the Wicklow voters is what they themselves said in the ballot boxes—that 1,753 more of them were in favour of the Fianna Fáil candidate than of any of the others. Similarly in relation to East Limerick, where, despite all the efforts of the Coalition leaders and the canvassers, the voters refused to do as they were instructed to do by the Fine Gael and Labour schemers, and this discriminatory and unfair transferable vote system failed to encompass the defeat of the Fianna Fáil candidate and thereby circumvent the will of the people.
In East Limerick there were 6,487— almost 6½ thousand—more voters who wanted the Fianna Fáil candidate elected, and despite the loaded counting system it was not possible to change the result. Here again there is evidence of the discrimination that is involved in this system of the transferable vote. There were 21,399 voters who did not vote for the successful candidate and of these 11,248 got a second vote, some of them got a third vote and 10,151 got one vote only. Again I ask the Opposition to tell me why this was done, why had these 10,151 not got as much right to a second chance as those to whom the second chance was given? I draw attention again to the pattern—the biggest group in the constituency getting one vote, the next biggest getting two votes and the smallest getting three votes.
In fact, since that by-election the Labour Party have been stoutly maintaining that their coalition effort was better and more effective than Fine Gael's, that their canvassing for their Coalition partners was more effective. We do not know, of course. We do know they made an all-out effort, which makes a mockery of their reply to the recent Fine Gael pleas to form a Coalition openly. Now, we say they should have the same rights and that it is unfair that merely because there were 112 more people supporting the Labour candidate than the Fine Gael candidate, that those voters should get one vote only whereas Fine Gael supporters got two votes.
Here again, in East Limerick, the only thing known from the result is that there were almost 6½ thousand more voters who wanted the Fianna Fáil candidate elected than any other and there is no way of establishing that that is not the position. I am satisfied beyond all doubt, then, that there is no possible justification for the transferable vote system and that this is particularly so in regard to single-member constituencies. I am also satisfied that there is no other justifiable system of voting but the straight vote system.
Against this, Deputy Norton suggests that there is a poor chance of the admitted advantages of the single-member constituency being obtained with the straight vote incorporated in the proposal, and that the adoption of this discriminatory system of the transferable vote would make it more certain that this important electoral reform would be obtained. I suggest that in view of the overwhelming case against the transferable vote it is necessary for him to show even that expediency does in fact demand the adoption of this system of voting, and I do not think he can do this.
As far as I am concerned, I have confidence in the people of the country doing the sensible thing providing we succeed in putting the arguments before them, and with the assistance of the knowledge that a substantial percentage of the Opposition Parties appreciate that what we are doing is what is required in the interests of the people of the country, we expect to be able to put the arguments before the people.
It is quite true as Deputy Norton says that this proposal was defeated narrowly some nine years ago, but the people have had more experience of the system since. They have seen the discreditable and disedifying long counts in two constituencies in the last General Election. They have seen the fact that each count could produce a different result and it has been demonstrated to them that in a tight situation it is purely a matter of chance which bundle of votes is selected for further distribution and that even on the basis of the theory of the system there is no finality with regard to the result.
As well, as Deputy Norton said himself, there are a substantial number of new voters who will be voting on this occasion who have not had the opportunity of ridding themselves of the present unsuitable system. I am satisfied the Opposition Parties cannot counter the arguments against the transferable vote. They cannot show any reason why one voter should be discriminated against in this way. Their attitude here, as in other things, is opposition because this proposal has been put forward by Fianna Fáil. It is an attitude based, as Deputy Fitzpatrick has admitted, on suspicion, on their inherent dread of Fianna Fáil, rather than on a reasoned case.
What we propose here is the best system and we can see no reason to abandon it. I fully agree that the main objective is to get rid of all the disadvantages of the multi-member constituency and to obtain the advantages of the single member constituency. I have shown that the system of the transferable vote is unjustifiable but in so far as we in Fianna Fáil are concerned, we have no reason to be afraid of this system of voting or any other system of voting. We have confidence in the people and the Wicklow and East Limerick by-elections obviously represent the maximum Coalition effort and we obviously have nothing to fear from the all-out efforts of the Fine Gael and Labour Party leaders to direct the people who support their policies to transfer their votes in accordance with the wishes of the Party leaders. I am satisfied that even those who are misguided enough to vote for the other Parties cannot in fact be directed to dispose of their votes in any particular way. We are quite confident of our future in any circumstances, whether it is in the present circumstances or not, and it is not for any reason connected with the maintenance of Fianna Fáil as either the majority Party or as the Government that these proposals are being made, but in order to obtain for the country the benefits of a more rational system of election and representation and to obtain the benefits of better representation and a better Parliament for the people. It is for that reason that these proposals are put forward.
As I have said, we have no reason to fear any particular system of counting the votes, or indeed of manipulating the votes after they have been cast and counted, but there is no justification for the transferable vote. We believe that the people will accept the proposition we are putting to them. The only argument I can see that was put forward in favour of Deputy Norton's amendment is his personal belief that to accept this system of voting would make it more likely that the main advantage to the country of single-member constituencies would be obtained. I think that has not been demonstrated and that there is no reason to believe that the people who concede the advantages of single-member constituencies would desire to retain the present system of voting, which discriminates in a completely unjustifiable way in giving multiple votes to certain members of the community and only single votes to others.