The Department of the Environment has rejected charges that it had advance knowledge last January that the Government would hold a citizenship referendum.
The Department ordered 300 extra NEDAP/Powervote voting machines last January at a discounted price of approximately €1.5 million.
In a letter to Powervote, the head of the Department's Franchise Section, Mr Peter Greene, wrote: "There are strong indications that there may be a further ballot paper at the June polls. This would increase time of voters at voting machines."
Questioned last night, the Department of the Environment denied that Mr Greene had been told to prepare for a referendum on citizenship: "He has been involved in elections for a long time. There is always the possibility that something will be added to a ballot paper.
"He was just being generally prudent," the Department's spokesman told The Irish Times last night.
"There is no conspiracy here. There was a possibility that something would be added," said the spokesman, though he was unable to state exactly what other referendum proposals were circulating in January.
"There is an onus on us to be prudent. The Government did not have a topic in mind," said the spokesman, while other sources said most Cabinet ministers were surprised when the proposal was first mooted last month.
Meanwhile, Sinn Féin, which strongly favours the granting of birthright citizenship, will lay out its campaign to oppose the June referendum, following a meeting of the party's Árd Comhairle in Dublin today.
"From the very first, Sinn Féin has been firmly opposed to the referendum on the grounds that it will aggravate racism. It will remove rights guaranteed under the Good Friday agreement. The proposed timing and process are opportunist and irresponsible. The Minister has been unable to provide evidence for his claims and has misused aggregate statistics to mislead the public," said Mr Aengus Ó Snodaigh.
Meanwhile, a tns/mrbi opinion poll commissioned by Fine Gael claims a majority of voters want electronic voting to be abandoned, or delayed until security concerns are dealt with.
The poll found that 47 per cent favoured the new system, 37 per cent wanted it delayed pending further checks, while 12 per cent wanted the system to be abandoned altogether.
