Electoral boundaries issue 'likely to be revisited'

A Donegal TD has said the possibility of Donegal returning to a county-wide constituency – or two constituencies – will likely be revisited after the next election.

Deputy Thomas Pringle said there is a clear need for the county to revert back to one unit “as in the whole county of Donegal”.

There had been much speculation that the constituency boundaries in County Donegal would revert back to two three seaters. However, an Electoral Commission review, which was published in August, recommended no change.

During the review period, numerous submissions were made from people in Donegal requesting that the nine Electoral Districts in the south of the county currently in the Sligo-Leitrim constituency be returned to the county.

But no change whatsoever was recommended meaning Donegal will remain a single five-seat constituency for now.

Deputy Pringle said the county should have at least gone back to a Donegal South West and Donegal North East arrangement.

Addressing the Dáil on Tuesday evening, the deputy said he believed, on balance, that the Electoral Commission had taken too conservative a position on changes to constituency boundaries.

He was speaking on the Electoral (Amendment) Bill 2023, which sets in legislation the make-up of the next Dáil at 177 members, recognising the constitutional imperative of one TD for every 20,000 to 30,000 citizens.

“I think really and truly what the constituency review has done at this stage is basically kicked to touch,” he said.

“Because they’re going to have to revisit this, probably after the next election again, and then at that time Donegal is going to have to change and Sligo/Leitrim is going to have to change.”

He added: “I think the idea that the county boundaries should be maintained is vitally important and should permeate all of our thinking in relation to this.”

He said he believed that can be achieved, adding, “In order to do that I think we have to revisit the constitutional imperative of one TD for 20,000 to 30,000 people and I think that’s what we should be looking at overall to ensure it will be done.”

The deputy said the numbers of TDs cannot be looked at in isolation and must be considered in terms of local government reform. He rejected suggestions that there were too many TDs.

Deputy Pringle said: “I think if you look at similar-sized countries across Europe they have a very similar type representation to us and we should be looking at those.

“If you look at England and how their representation looks, yes definitely we have more TDs than they have MPs, but I don’t think we should be looking there across the water at any time to see how we should be going.”

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