Recommended changes to Dáil and European Parliament constituencies, arising from shifts in population identified by the 2006 census, will cause many of our public representatives to fret at night. Serious political controversy is unlikely to develop, however, because the sensitive work was undertaken by an Independent Constituency Commission.
The boundaries of more than half of the Dáil's 43 constituencies will be modified to a greater or lesser extent, with potential knock-on effects on the vote-getting capacity of sitting TDs. And significant alterations will take place to European Parliament boundaries.
In general terms, the commission adopted a minimalist approach. Three-seater constituencies tend to favour the larger political parties, with Independents and the smaller parties faring best in five-seaters. While the number of five-seaters and three-seaters both fell by one, this was balanced by an increase in the number of four-seaters. Dáil representation remained unchanged at 146 TDs and the number of constituencies at 43.
Dublin West and Louth will gain a seat, while Dún Laoghaire Rathdown and Limerick East will lose one. Part of Limerick will go into Kerry North. Leitrim will remain truncated. And there will be 19 other significant boundary changes. Maintaining continuity with past decisions was an obvious consideration for the commission, a task made more complex by the need to keep population averages per seat within acceptable tolerances.
Ambitious councillors and would-be Dáil candidates will take a keen interest in the proposed boundaries. For, while the local elections of 2009 represent the most immediate political hurdle, their geographic location within revised constituencies could decide whether they will be favoured by head office. Oireachtas members will have conflicting responses. The transfer of sizable population clusters could have benign or devastating impacts on their election prospects and this will encourage competition across existing boundaries. Given the prevalence of parish pump politics, voters should acquaint themselves with the new boundaries in order to ensure their representations have maximum impact. Although the 30th Dáil has nearly five years to run, TDs under threat from the proposed arrangements may well concentrate their energies elsewhere.
A 20 per cent reduction in representation to the European Parliament during the past 10 years - from 15 to 13 and now to 12 seats - has forced major changes to those constituency boundaries. The commission has recommended the establishment of four three-seater constituencies on this occasion. That will involve Dublin losing a seat and the creation of a greatly enlarged North West constituency that will embrace 11 counties. At the same time, the disappearance of four and five-seater constituencies is expected to provide Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael with a political advantage. In a situation where it was impossible to placate every interest, the commission has struck a reasonable balance.