MacSharry recommends constituency changes that would retain county boundaries

Deputy Marc MacSharry has made a submission to the Electoral Commission for consideration in their review, specifically with regard to the current Sligo Leitrim Constituency which currently incorporates all, or a significant portion of, Counties Sligo, Leitrim, Donegal, and Roscommon.

The following is Deputy MacSharry's submission made to the Secretary of the Electoral Commission.

1. The existing constituency incorporating County Sligo, County Leitrim, South County Donegal, and North County Roscommon serves to exasperate the alienation of rural Ireland and undermines the constitutional entitlement of equal representation of all citizens in a practical, workable, and cohesive way in Dail Eireann.

2. The current arrangements are totally contrary to the literal meaning and spirit of the terms of the Electoral Reform Act 2022 in particular section 56 (2) (C) where it states that 'the breaching of County Boundaries shall be avoided as far as practicable'.

I would respectfully submit that sufficient practicable considerations were not applied in the division of Counties to the extent that as things stand there is all or part of four counties in the Sligo-Leitrim constituency and therefore county boundaries were recklessly dissected rather than proactively and thoughtfully maintained. This must be rectified in the current review.

3. In addition, section 56 (2) (e) of the Electoral Reform Act 2022 is also not represented in the current arrangements where geographic considerations and physical features were clearly not given due regard.

The existence of mountains, rivers, difficult terrain, and the blatant absence of adequate physical connectivity infrastructure in terms of road, rail and public transport would seem to have been completely ignored.

It is as if the previous commission resolved to deal with these counties towards the end of the process and simply assembled an absurd 'patch work' constituency to facilitate an outcome which was neither required nor demanded by the constitutional criteria either in number of seats or ratio of seats to population.

4. Section 56 (2) (D) of the Act states that “each constituency shall be composed of contiguous areas.” The composition of the current Sligo Leitrim South Donegal North Roscommon constituency clearly also stretches both the literal meaning and spirit of this section.

Practicable is a word regularly used in previous court decisions going back to 1961 in relation to these matters and within the current act itself.

The inclusion of part or all of four counties in what is known as the Sligo-Leitrim constituency is not remotely practicable.

In this regard, it must be realised and accepted that there are four County Councils, four different planning authorities, four different housing departments, four Joint policing committees, two Garda Divisions, two Community Health Organisations which causes significant practical difficulty for elected members of Dail Eireann seeking to provide an equally representative, effective, and efficient service to citizens when compared to an elected member of the Dail dealing with only one of each of the above.

The constituency, as currently configured, is approximately 120 km long at its furthest point and 120 kilometres wide at its furthest point.

Equally, the necessity to have equal representation in the legislature for each of these areas is undermined by the variance of needs of and challenges facing very different locations which in many cases require very different types of solutions to be represented on their behalf in the national legislature.

Notwithstanding the genuine intention and wish of all representatives to do the best possible job in providing effective representation to constituents the sprawling and haphazard makeup of the current arrangements in Sligo, Leitrim, South Donegal and North Roscommon totally undermines the true potential for effective representation of citizens living in the area.

5. The county boundaries of Sligo, Leitrim, Donegal and Roscommon must be respected and maintained at all costs. A critical mass of Dail representation will exist in the higher populated urban areas where the needs and challenges of those areas will not vary to the same extent as those crossing county boundaries as exemplified in the current makeup of the so-called Sligo-Leitrim constituency which currently incorporates all or a significant part of four counties.

The increase in TDs to a minimum of 171 and their distribution should be weighted entirely in favour of guaranteeing that each county or two entire counties collectively which make up a constituency ought to have a minimum of one TD each representing their interests in Dail Eireann.

To seek to facilitate this, two counties should be aligned together in their entirety where necessary to form a constituency but the patch work approach of pieces of several counties being stitched together must be abandoned permanently.

6. I would like to submit that if the Electoral Commission feel the Act and its sections are in effect inadequate to cater for the constitutional right of all people to equal representation then the Commission ought seek more time to facilitate the introduction of a new Electoral Amendment Act underpinned, if necessary, by a constitutional referendum to amend article 16.2.2 to provide for a variance in representative population thresholds which more accurately reflect the potential to cater for the new reality of population decline in some parts of counties, rural alienation and isolationism and the proliferation of growth on the East coast.

Notwithstanding this, I would submit that the current criteria and provisions of Article 16.2.2 do allow for the following four constituencies to be permitted and I am therefore respectfully submitting that the Constituency Commission recommend the following constituencies be established:

Donegal 1*
Population: 166,321
No. of Dail Seats: 3
Population per Dáil Seat: 27,720.16

Donegal 2**
Population: 166,321
No. of Dail Seats: 3
Population per Dáil Seat: 27,720.16

Sligo/Leitrim
Population: 104,906
No. of Dail Seats: 4
Population per Dáil Seat: 26,226.50

Roscommon/Longford
Population: 116,629
No. of Dail Seats: 4
Population per Dáil Seat: 29,157.25

* Population statistics are taken from the CSO Census 2022 Provisional Results February 2023.
** Donegal can be split into two 3-seat constituencies as best determined by the population distribution of the county as can be considered by the Commission in line with the final CSO 2022 Census Results.

This will, in effect, mean that county boundaries are maintained and that all people in the reference areas will have representation in Dail Eireann consistent with the needs and challenges of these areas and the people's constitutional right to have adequate voice for such needs and challenges within the formation of legislation and debate at national level.

It will also mean that elected members of Dail Eireann have a more practicable and manageable number of state authorities and agencies functioning within their constituencies.

If the approach as taken in 2017 is allowed to continue it will inevitably lead within a few decades to a totally disproportionate level of representation in larger urban centres which could not have been envisaged at the time the constitution was being written nor would it be in keeping with the explicit ambitions of the constitution when considered in its entirety.

I thank you for taking the time to consider this submission and very much hope that you will include this proposal as one of your final recommendations.

Marc Mac Sharry TD