Cross-party action urged on voters' register

There were 300,000 more names on the electoral register than eligible voters mainly due to the slowness to remove the names of dead people, the increase in the number of second homes, and people moving without advising the local authority, the Dáil was told.

Minister for the Environment Dick Roche said it was the duty of the local authorities to ensure the accuracy of the register. In some local authorities "there is good practice, while in others it is very clear the practice is not good enough".

There will be a national awareness campaign this year for the preparation of the next register and new guidelines.

Mr Roche called for a "cross-party approach" to resolve the problem. He wanted to "see the matter resolved in the very near future".

He also pointed to recent legislation which made unlawful possession or use of someone else's polling card a specific offence. "Strong legislation must be mirrored locally by vigilance on the part of polling staff."

Ciaran Cuffe (Greens, Dún Laoghaire) said "reform of the electoral rolls is not rocket science", and the State should have followed the example of Northern Ireland where the electoral office calls to each household twice a year at a cost of £6 million. "Surely the system could be replicated in the Republic for about €15 million, a mere fraction of the cost of electronic voting."

There was a "glaring anomaly in the current system of compilation of electoral rolls which delegates the function to local authorities without providing for the centralised cross-checking of the individuals registered" through their PPS numbers.

However, Mr Roche said it was "not as simple as it would appear", with difficulties with data protection.

The Sunday Tribune reported that there were more than 300,000 people on the register who did not have the right to vote. This was "not good enough", said Mr Cuffe, who called on Mr Roche to "talk to county managers and the Revenue collectors, who often do the work in question in local authorities, and ask them why the register is a mess, what resources have been invested and what action is required".

Fergus O'Dowd (FG, Louth) said the issue of people living in flats and apartments needed to be addressed.

"Recently I came across an apartment complex from which no one voted at the last election as people had moved on and the register was out of date."