The Electoral Commission (An Coimisiún Toghcháin) is an election commission with responsibility for the oversight of all elections in Ireland, including electoral operations, constituency reviews and electoral integrity. It was established in 2023. Prior to its establishment, some of these functions had been carried out by various government departments, local government officials, statutory agencies and components of the Oireachtas and in the case of Boundaries by a judge led commission, while other functions are novel to the new Commission.
A proposal for an electoral commission was first considered in a government report commissioned in 2008, and was developed by a series of governments since then, before the publication of the heads of a bill in 2021.
In March 2021 it was announced that Art O'Leary, upon completion in June 2021 of his seven-year term as Secretary General to the President, would be appointed to work on the preparatory institutional and administrative arrangements for the commission, pending its formal establishment.[3]
The 2023 budget earmarks €5.7m for the commission and a further €2.77m to enable local authorities to modernise the electoral register.[4]
Membership
The Commission may consist of between 7 and 9 members: a chair appointed from the judiciary, two ex officio members, and four to six ordinary members.[5]
On 30 August 2023, it published a review of Dáil constituency boundaries, in which it recommended an increase in the size of the Dáil from 160 to 174 TDs, to be elected in 43 constituencies.[12] It included the establishment of new constituencies:
In 2008, the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government commissioned and published a study on introducing an electoral commission, carried out by academics from University College Dublin.[15] After the 2011 general election, the Fine Gael and Labour parties formed a coalition government whose programme included a commitment to establish an electoral commission.[16] Such a commission was also recommended in the Constitutional Convention's 2013 report on the system of elections to Dáil Éireann (lower house of the Oireachtas),[17] which was also endorsed the government.[18]Alan Kelly, the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, outlined progress of the plan in Seanad Éireann in December 2014,[19][20] The government published a consultation paper in January 2015, and said it intended to introduce a bill in the Oireachtas in 2015.[21] The Oireachtas Joint Committee on Environment, Culture and the Gaeltacht discussed the plan with Alan Kelly on 10 March 2015. Kelly stated that drafting the enabling bill would begin when the committee had consulted and reported back to him, that he expected the bill to be enacted by the end of 2015, that the commission would not be established before the next general election, and that functions should be assigned to it on a phased basis.[22] In April 2015 the committee invited submissions on the government's consultation paper from interest groups,[23] and held hearings with them in June and July.[24] The committee's report was launched on 14 January 2016.[25]
After the 2016 general election, a minority coalition government was formed by Fine Gael and Independent TDs with confidence and supply support from Fianna Fáil. Its programme committed to establishing an electoral commission "independent of Government and directly accountable to the Oireachtas".[26][27] The government's September 2016 list of planned legislation included the Electoral Commission Bill in the Department of Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government's "medium and long term" plans.[28] In June 2017, the department was preparing a Regulatory Impact Analysis (RIA).[29] In October 2017, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar said there was "no timeframe" for establishing the commission and it was "very much a long-term project".[30] In September 2018 John Paul Phelan, Minister of State for Local Government and Electoral Reform, gave an update to the Seanad. He said a priority was "modernisation" of the electoral register, which different local authorities had been maintaining in divergent manners; this would take "two to three years", involve "significant public consultation",[31] and proceed separately from work on an Electoral Commission.[32] The Electoral Commission RIA published in November 2018 compared four implementation strategies.[33] The ensuing public consultation received 23 submissions by the closing date of 15 March 2019.[32][34] In July 2019 Phelan said work was commencing on drafting the general scheme (outline) of an Electoral Commission Bill.[35]
The draft bill [38] sought both to modernise the electoral register and to establish an electoral commission with seven to nine members and a permanent staff.[41] The establishment provisions are modelled on the Policing Authority established in 2015.
The commission's staff would be members of the Civil Service of the State, with a Chief Executive recommended by the Commission for Public Service Appointments.[43]
Envisaged functions
The Constitutional Convention took the Australian Electoral Commission and UK Electoral Commission as case studies of possible models for the Irish body.[44] The various official reports listed functions which might be performed by the commission, and noted who is currently responsible for them. The bill published in 2021 would give some of these as "initial functions" to the commission it establishes, leaving open the possibility for others to be transferred to it at a later date.[45][41] Academics addressing a pre-legislative scrutiny meeting said the bill lacked ambition and the commission's structure left it "little room for expansion" to new activities.[46]
The 2016 government programme says the commission should "look at ways to increase participation in our political process through voter education and turnout".[26]
The Oireachtas report emphasises independent research. The 2018 report of the Interdepartmental Group on the Security of Ireland's Electoral Process and Disinformation suggested some policy functions would remain within the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government.[49]
The 2021 bill includes wide-ranging reforms to the registration process, with local authorities retaining some responsibility under the supervision of the new electoral commission.[50]
The 2018 report of the Interdepartmental Group on the Security of Ireland's Electoral Process and Disinformation foresees a role for the Electoral Commission.[49] The 2021 bill scheme gives the commission "a key role in relation to the regulation of onlinepolitical advertising during election periods",[45] which was praised by Michela Palese of the British Electoral Reform Society.[41] The Commission would have power to investigate but not to adjudicate or impose penalties, and could initiate criminal proceedings only with the consent of the Director of Public Prosecutions.[51]
Returning officers publish summaries in Iris Oifigiúil shortly after the poll; the department publishes detailed results later. The Oireachtas report addresses real-time official publication online.
Elections to the Seanad
Vocational panel elections are overseen by the clerk of the Seanad; elections for NUI and Dublin U are overseen by respective universities
DECLG
The working group established after the defeat of the 2013 Seanad abolition referendum reported in 2015 on proposed reforms, which included radical changes in the Seanad electoral system and the creation of a "Seanad Electoral Commission" to oversee this.[52][53] The working group's report recognised that the Electoral Commission already proposed by the government would, if established, make a separate Seanad Electoral Commission unnecessary.[52] Consideration of a private member's bill to extend the franchise for university constituencies was adjourned in November 2020 to await the Electoral Commission's establishment.[54]
[JCHLGH] Oireachtas Joint Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage, General Scheme of the Electoral Reform Bill 2020: Discussion (2021) 22 Jan, 2 Feb, 23 Mar, 30 Mar, 20 May, 22 Jun
^"11–15 January 2016". This Week in the Houses of the Oireachtas. Oireachtas. January 2016. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 12 January 2016. Report Launch / Report on the Consultation on the Proposed Electoral Commission 2016 /Joint Committee on Environment, Culture and the Gaeltacht / Audio Visual Room, LH2000, on Thursday, 14 January 2016 at 11 a.m.
^"Legislation Programme Autumn 2016"(PDF). Office of the Government Chief Whip. 27 September 2016. pp. 6, 24. Archived(PDF) from the original on 5 October 2016. Retrieved 4 October 2016.
^ abWorking Group on Seanad Reform (April 2015). "Report"(PDF). Department of the Taoiseach. p. 37. Archived(PDF) from the original on 18 May 2015. Retrieved 13 May 2015. The Working Group recognises that the Electoral Commission, to be established by the Government, would have responsibility far beyond Seanad Elections and in that regard that the Interim body and its functions would be subsumed into the wider Electoral Commission.
^Working Group on Seanad Reform (5 May 2015). "Part 8: Seanad Electoral Commission"(PDF). Seanad Bill 2015 [draft]. Department of the Taoiseach. pp. 24–25. Archived(PDF) from the original on 18 May 2015. Retrieved 13 May 2015.
