Press Release: ‘CHECK THE REGISTER’ SYSTEM FOR SEANAD UNIVERSITY PANEL VOTERS
08 July 2015
STATEMENT BY SENATOR IVANA BACIK
Labour Senator Ivana Bacik, Seanad Spokesperson on Justice,
Wednesday 8th July, 2015
BACIK CALLS FOR ‘CHECK THE REGISTER’ SYSTEM FOR SEANAD UNIVERSITY PANEL VOTERS
Speaking during a debate on Seanad reform in the Seanad today, Labour Senator Ivana Bacik called for the introduction of wide-ranging reforms of the Seanad, and made constructive proposals based upon the Report of the Working Group on Seanad Reform.
The proposals made by Senator Bacik included the recommendation that the existing registers of voters on the University Seanad panels (ie the registers kept by the NUI and by Dublin University) should be accessible online by graduates, in the same way that the General Election registers is accessible online at www.checktheregister.ie.
Senator Bacik said: “The Seanad Éireann Registers which are published annually by Dublin University and the NUI contain a list of the names, addresses and qualifications of those graduates who may vote in Seanad Éireann elections on the Universities panel.
“Hard copies of the Registers may be consulted in the libraries of the various institutions within the relevant universities, but it is not currently possible for graduates who are potential voters to check their registration status online.
“However, the strength of the #Hometovote campaign in the recent Marriage Equality referendum demonstrated how important it is for a modern functioning democracy that individuals are able to check their voter registration status easily.
“Even before the more significant wide-scale and necessary reforms of the Seanad electoral process are introduced through legislation, I believe that this reform should be carried out: that we should ensure access by University graduates to the details of the Seanad panel electoral register in electronic format.”
You can watch the full contribution on YouTube.