Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 29 Nov 2023

I move:

That it be an instruction to the Committee on the Electoral (Amendment) Bill 2023, that pursuant to Standing Order 187, the Committee has power to make amendments to the Bill which are outside the scope of the existing provisions of the Bill in relation to giving effect to European Council Decision (EU) 2023/2061 of 22nd September, 2023, establishing the composition of the European Parliament, and providing for the revision of European Parliament constituencies including the number of members to be elected for such constituencies.

And to change the consequential amendment of the long title to reflect the content of the Bill, and make other consequential amendments required to take account of the changes above.

I move amendment No. 1:

To insert the following after "for such constituencies":

"and to make amendments to statutory provisions requiring the publication of the addresses of candidates at elections".

I put forward an amendment to the motion to instruct the committee to say that there should amendments made to statutory provisions requiring the publication of the addresses of candidates at elections. The purpose of the amendment is to allow for the Long Title of the Bill to be changed so that the Bill itself can be amended so as to protect the home addresses of political candidates.

It is a critical issue. We see difficulties, particularly in the wake of real concerns around threats on social media and threats from the far right, with candidates being fearful about running for political office, partly because of the convention that home addresses are published. We wanted to tackle this. I had a principal amendment on the Bill down. It was ruled out of order. I raised this on Committee Stage of the Bill last week. I am simply asking that we might amend the motion to reflect this issue. If the Government will not accept this amendment, and I am asking the Minister of State to accept it, then I will push this to a vote which I think will be taken later in the deferred block.

The intent of the Bill is to provide for constituency revision having regard to the recent reviews of our Dáil and European Parliament constituencies by An Coimisiún Toghcháin. It was never intended that the Bill provide for miscellaneous amendments to the Electoral Acts as would be the case were the scope of the Bill to be extended. Notwithstanding the scope of the Bill, the practice of publishing postal addresses on ballot papers is an important issue, as the Deputy has said, in light of the concerns that have been raised having particular regard to safety in political life. The issue was discussed on Committee Stage of the Bill and more recently at yesterday’s meeting between the Joint Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage, officials from my Department and officials from An Coimisiún Toghcháin. At both meetings it was signalled that An Coimisiún Toghcháin has published and has announced a public consultation on its draft research programme 2024-26, setting out items as proposed to undertake research on. An Coimisiún Toghcháin is currently inviting all interested parties to make submissions on both the draft programme and on any additional research projects that might be considered important to promote and enhance Ireland’s democracy and electoral events before 12 January 2024. At yesterday’s meeting the commission indicated that it would be prepared to examine this matter if requested to do so. Furthermore my colleague, the Minister, Deputy O’Brien, has signalled that he would welcome research on this matter suggesting alternatives to the use of postal addresses.

I met with Women for Election some weeks ago and gave commitments in relation to this. There is instruction that can be given to returning officers in relation to the postal address. I would be more than happy to circulate a note to Deputy Bacik and other Deputies on that. However, I oppose the amendment.