My reaction to the Constituency Commission Report

The report of the Constituency Commission was released this afternoon.

Like pretty much everyone else in the Dublin 15 area, I welcome the addition of an extra seat to the Dublin West constituency. We are currently massively underrepresented, and like many other people, the Green Party called for an extra seat for the constituency in our submission. However, I do find the decision of the Commission to include a large portion of Swords within the constituency as bizarre. While like Dublin 15, Swords is part of Fingal County Council, I feel there is very little connection between Swords and places like Mulhuddart, Blanchardstown or Castleknock.

While the old Dublin West constituency did require extra population to justify a forth seat, I think that this would have been better achieved if extra territory had been added along the Navan Road and Ashtown as this area would have much more of a connection to Dublin 15. This was what we in the Green Party suggested in our submission.

Now that our Dail representation has been addressed, the next step that must be taken is to rebalance the number of county councillors that the Dublin 15 area elects, as here again we are hugely underrepresented. I look forward to the Minister for the Environment, John Gormley, rapidly setting up a new Commission to redraw the boundaries of local authority wards in time for the Local Elections.

Hoever, I’m deeply disappointed that the Constituency Commission had recommend that Dublin loses one MEP for the next Euro Elections. This now leaves Dublin the most under-represented of the Euro constituencies in the country, with over 42,000 more people per MEP than any other constituency. The Commission has shown absolutely no imagination in deciding to go with four 3 seat constituencies.