The Attorney General is today expected to clear the way for the full roll-out of electronic voting in June's local and European elections.
The Cabinet will be briefed during its weekly meeting today by the Attorney General, Mr Rory Brady, following the High Court's judgment in the Carrickmines case.
In that case, the court ruled that the Government should have drafted primary legislation for some of its actions, rather than depending on the use of government regulations.
The ruling raised serious question marks over the use of regulations and fears that a significant number of them would have to be withdrawn and replaced by primary legislation.
Fine Gael, Labour and the Green Party will tonight join forces in the Dáil to call on the Government to call off plans to spread the usage of electronic voting.
The Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, last night stood by the new system: "I am told that the reliability of the system has been tested and that it is good. I have seen no hard evidence that there is a problem with this. The system has been used here. It has been used in referendums. It has been used in the general election."
He rejected criticism levelled by American academic, Dr David Dill of Stanford University, who said electronic voting could not be trusted unless a paper record was kept. Seemingly irked by the number of international critics criticising the system, Mr Ahern said the Republic of Ireland is now the biggest exporter of computer software in the world.
"We should not need international experts to tell us because we export more to these countries than they ever created themselves," he said caustically.
The decision of Fine Gael, Labour and the Green Party to combine on tonight's Dáil private members' motion is the first time the three have done so during the life of this Dáil.
The motion, which will be opposed by a counter motion from the Government, will be debated during Fine Gael's private members' time on Tuesday and Wednesday evenings.
It calls on the Government "to immediately defer plans for the use of electronic voting" until an independent electoral commission has been established and has addressed "legitimate concerns" about the issue.
The leader of Fine Gael, Mr Kenny, said "serious concern" now exists about the Government's refusal to ensure that the NEDAP/Powervote system keeps a paper record of each vote cast.
The leader of the Labour Party, Mr Rabbitte, said electronic voting creates "considerable legal uncertainty" about the upcoming elections as its widespread introduction will prompt legal challenges.
The leader of the Green Party, Mr Sargent, said the Government had reneged on a promise not to introduce e-voting in all constituencies unless the Opposition was satisfied.
Meanwhile the manufacturers of the 6,500 voting machines to be used in Irish elections last night said the French authorities are to use the same system in pilot tests this year.
Some 90 machines will be used by 80,000 people during local elections in Brest next month, while the system will be extended to a number of other constituencies for the June European parliamentary elections.
Rejecting criticisms of the electronic voting machines, Mr Roy Loudon, managing director of Powervote UK, said: "The fact that over 70m votes have been cast and counted on our systems without one challenge being raised gives some sense of the integrity of the solution that we have made available."
