Let me repeat: we have had stability of government here for some 36 years, since 1932, of which Fianna Fáil has been in office for over 31. If Fianna Fáil has been in office and the stability thus manifested has been due to PR, will those who urge us to retain that system tell us why were the Coalition governments driven from office if PR is a good system for electing a government. Why were the Coalition unable to maintain themselves in office? Why, when they constituted the government of this country, did they lose every general election they fought as a government? The only answer they can give to that question without incriminating themselves is that they lost office because of the system of election. That is the only answer they can give, unless they are prepared to say: "We lost office because we were a bad government", and with that I would be disposed to agree.
A Party with a strong national tradition, bound together by a common policy, might withstand the divisive influences of PR. It would not fragment under the strain which the system imposes on its unity. But a Party less cohesive, less firm in its convictions than is Fianna Fáil would succumb under PR as the Coalitions did. But PR is bad not only because it tends to foster and encourage fragmentation of political opinion and of political activity. It is bad also because it weakens the association, the communication between the people's representatives and the people themselves.
The system of election by transferable vote is a weak system mainly because it is based on an inherent contradiction, that is to say, in certain circumstances a person's second choice is as valid as his first. Not so long as the world is finite can this be. A person's first choice in the opinion of him who makes it must always be superior to his second. So, election by transferable vote is a system in which the result is based on the triumph of the second best and must always tend to produce an inferior parliament. But this detrimental tendency, however, is aggravated when the transferable vote is combined with a multi-seat constituency.
I said that the weaknesses of the transferable vote are aggravated when it operates in a multi-seat constituency, but the statement in converse would more accurately describe what I have in mind, that the evil, the great evil, the primary evil arising from the multi-seat constituency is heightened by the transferable vote. Both of them tend to weaken democracy but the multi-seat constituency tends to do so in greater measure. It may well be that we cannot get rid of both but if I had to choose between one or the other I would unhesitatingly opt to get rid of the multi-seat constituency. I would give to each constituency, to the electors and the people of each constituency, its own member. I would give them a firmer voice in the election of their Deputy. I would place on their Deputy an immediate and direct responsibility that it is impossible to attach to one individual in the system we have today.
I should like to say here a word about the primary duty of people in a democracy. What is the fundamental obligation that rests on parliament? It is the same in both cases. It is to provide the community—whether the fundamental obligation rests on parliament or the electorate, it is the same in both cases—with a government that has the willingness, the steadfastness and the authority to rule. Those are obligations that are being hardly fulfilled in these days. They are certainly not being fulfilled in Belgium, Italy, Germany or France.
Why is this? It is because in all those countries responsibility is not firmly fixed on the representatives of the people and because of this the governments cannot rely on parliament to support them and, accordingly, they are unwilling to take up the gauntlet when lawless elements in society defy them. The thoughtful members of our community look at those evils as they develop abroad. They see them associated with one common factor, electoral systems which destroy civic and political cohesion so that authority is not firmly based and governments cannot withstand the mob.
Our people want a change in the electoral system. The figures for by-elections which have taken place in recent years indicate this. It was strikingly manifested in East Limerick the other day but no less so in the by-elections which preceded that one. In each of them the number of electors who are refusing to operate proportional representation has been increasing. I have gone through the figures for five of the by-elections, the five in which transfers of votes actually took place. In those elections there were 38,600 odd votes to be transferred. Of those 14,400 odd went to Fine Gael, 8,300 odd went to Fianna Fáil and 6,760 went to Labour but 9,090 votes were non-transferable, that is to say, almost 25 per cent of the voters did not exercise their right to express a second preference. This, having regard to the strenuousness with which by-elections are fought, is a remarkable and significant figure. In a by-election as much energy and persuasiveness is devoted to obtaining second preference for one's preferred candidate as in endeavouring to secure firsts for them. Notwithstanding this, as I said, about 25 per cent of those people refrained from exercising their rights. This indicates so far as they were concerned they had no use whatsoever and no regard for the virtues or merits of proportional representation.
Four out of five of the by-elections I have referred to were won by the Fianna Fáil candidate. Those were elections in which the Fianna Fáil candidates were not elected on the first count. In the final results, however, there had been 78,794 votes cast for them in these five constituencies as against 7,649 for their opponents. Those 78,000-odd voters can be taken roughly as against proportional representation. We may add to that figure 9,090 who refused to state any second preference, repudiating, in fact, proportional representation in the most forceful way. This makes in all almost 89,000 voters who were against proportional representation and roughly 70,000-odd voters who were more or less in favour of it. In those circumstances why not give the people a chance to pronounce on the question? Why not allow the people to express their views on this? That is what we are doing.
The Government introduced those Bills to amend the Constitution. They cannot become law until they have been submitted to the people. All we are doing is giving the people a chance, if they wish to affirm what their votes in the by-elections seem to indicate, that they really are not in favour of proportional representation. Of course, there is some difficulty here because the position is that there is no association between the Deputy and the people who have elected him under the present system. As I said, we are in favour of single-seat constituencies. I cannot see any merits in the existing system and I have worked with it all my life. I can see great merit from the people's point of view in everybody being able to say: "John So-and-So represents my constituency. It does not matter what Party he belongs to. My interests will be safeguarded with him. He is my representative and if I am not getting what I am entitled to he will try to obtain it for me". That is what will happen in a single-seat constituency. The people in the particular constituency will know that their representative will look after their interests. That can only be done in a single-seat constituency. If I had a choice, as I said already, I would be prepared to opt for that rather than risk if I thought I was going to do it, losing both proposals, the abolition of the transferable vote, which I think is bad in itself for the reasons I have indicated, and the institution of the single-seat constituency. Of course we are not in fact the final judges in this matter. There may be differences of opinion about the transferable vote but I do not think there will be any difference of opinion amongst the vast majority of the people about the single-seat constituencies.
The only question arising at the moment is whether we cannot allow the people, first of all, to determine for themselves whether they want the single-seat constituency or whether they want the present system of multi-seat constituencies to continue, or whether they want to replace them by the single-seat constituencies. That is one question to which it is easy for them to answer "yes" or "no".
The other question we are putting to them according to the Bill now before the House is: do they want not merely the single-seat constituencies but also the non-transferable vote? That is a more difficult question for them to answer one way or another. They are likely to be confused by it. I wish we could discover some way whereby we could allow the people a full range of choice in this matter of whether they want to have the multi-seat constituencies with the transferable vote as we have it or the single-seat constituencies with the straight vote, which I certainly would like, or whether they would prefer, having regard to all the circumstances, to accept the single-seat constituencies with the transferable vote. I wish it were possible to put that issue to the people. We should see if we can, because in relation to amendments of the Constitution, just as in relation to the enactment of the Constitution, it is the people's vote which makes the determination.
We heard a lot of praise about the 1937 Constitution. What joy it gives my heart to hear the Constitution being praised from the Fine Gael benches. We carried it in spite of Fine Gael, and indeed in spite of Labour— rather disappointingly in spite of Labour, having regard to their fidelity to James Connolly. I would have hoped they would be on our side in relation to the Constitution but unfortunately for some reason or another they did not happen to be. However, that is water under the bridge and there is no use in reminding them of it.
It gives joy to my heart, and makes me really proud, that I had a hand in the drafting of the Constitution and, yes, advocating it before the House, to hear our friends on the Fine Gael benches laud it to the skies in the terms they have used. We have heard them praising Mr. de Valera. It is like water from the rock to hear Deputy Fitzpatrick and the rest of them praising Mr. de Valera. He was an old man in 1966! In the 50th year of the Rising in which he was such a distinguished figure, he was an old man whom they attempted to traduce from one town to another throughout the length and breadth of this island. It is grand to hear them quoting him as an authority.
Dev never believed he was infallible. He was prepared on conviction and on argument to change his mind. He did change his mind in 1959. It does not matter in 1968 what Dev said in 1937 any more than it matters what the late Mr. W. T. Cosgrave said in 1927 about PR or what Mr. J.A. Costello, or more recently, Mr. Dillon or Mr. McGilligan said about it. All these things do not matter. What matters is what the people are thinking and saying today. What we are asking the Dáil to do is to give the people the opportunity of answering that question and can anything be done to allow them to have the question presented in a form which will enable them to have a full range of choice. If that cannot be done, we will either stand or fall on the questions as presented in the Bill. The question is whether we are going to abolish not merely the multi-seat constituencies but also the transferable vote. The abolition of the multi-seat constituencies and the creation of the single-seat constituencies would be one safeguard to democracy which we do not possess today.
