If the boundaries of electoral constituencies in this State had been revised before the May 24th election, the result in a number of constituencies "would have been different", the Labour Party said today.
The party said the Oireachtas should consider amending the law to allow the revision of electoral constituency boundaries when preliminary census figures are published.
Environment spokesman Eamon Gilmore was reacting to yesterday's High Court judgment in a case taken by two independent politicians against the Minister for the Environment over what they said was the under or over-representation of 10 constituencies in terms of the number of TDs in the Dáil.
Mr Gilmore noted that although the case was dismissed, Mr Justice Frank Clarke stated that urgent consideration should be given to amending the Electoral Act to allow the constituency review process to begin from the time of publication of the preliminary rather than the final census figures.
"There is no doubt that had the constituency boundaries been reviewed in advance of the recent election to reflect the changes in population experienced since 2002, then the outcome in a number of constituencies would have been different. Whether these would have been sufficient to alter the overall outcome of the election, nobody can say.
"In his judgment Mr. Justice Clarke accepted that the current constituency boundaries, on which the recent election was fought, were seriously out of line.
"The Oireachtas should now take the opportunity presented by Mr Justice Clarke's comments to ensure that the people are never again asked to go the polls on outdated constituency boundaries," Mr Gilmore said.
"There is clearly no longer any need to await final census figures to ensure that accurate data is available to allow a Constituency Commission to redraw boundaries. With the sophisticated information gathering systems now available to the CSO [Central Statistics Office], it has been clear for several decades that the differences between preliminary and final population figures are insignificant."
Under Article 16 of the 1937 Constitution, there should be at least one TD in the Dáil for every 30,000 of population and no more than one for every 20,000.
The High Court challenge was brought by Independent TD Finian McGrath and former Independent TD Catherine Murphy after they examined census figures. Ms Murphy, elected in a by-election in 2005, lost her seat in Kildare North in the recent election.
Using population statistics from the CSO, the pair claimed 10 constituencies were unconstitutional due to dwindling numbers in rural areas and booming migration to greater Dublin.
The pair, who brought the case a month before the election was called, argued that there are not enough TDs for growing populations and that democracy is being eroded as a result.
They claimed five constituencies were under-represented - Dublin West and North, Meath East and West and Laois-Offaly.
Five others were over-represented, they say - Cork North Central, Dún Laoghaire, Kerry North and South and Dublin North-East.