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Northside anger after 700 polling cards go missing

Friday, 20 June 2008

There was uproar on the Northside last week when it emerged that a batch of 700 polling cards for the Dublin Central constituency went missing.
Hundreds of locals from the Dublin 3 area were left unsure as to whether they were registered to vote in last week’s Lisbon Referendum because of the embarrassing blunder.
According to local TD Joe Costello, there was a lower than expected turn out at the polling station because of the gaffe.
“It is completely unacceptable that so many people from the one area could be disenfranchised from voting in such an important referendum,” he told Northside People.
“I’d say the majority of people who didn’t get their polling cards presumed that they were not registered to vote.”
It is understood that many people living in Leinster Street, Leinster Avenue, East Wall, Ossory Street and Faith and Hope Street were the worst affected by the error.

“Everyone is entitled to receive a polling card and unfortunately people wrongly thought that they could not vote without the card so they didn’t vote,” Deputy Costello added. “Many people are very frustrated and angry.
He added: “Those 700 or so ballots could have had a huge effect on the tally for that constituency seeing as it was pretty close between the Yes and No votes.”
A spokesman for the Franchise Section of Dublin City Council said all polling cards for the register had been printed.
“We are only responsible for the preparation and publication of the polling information cards,” he told Northside People.
“All the cards that we printed were handed over to the postal service for delivery.
“If people were not on the register then they would not have got a card anyway but if they were the cards are used to provide information on where they can vote.”
He added: “If someone didn’t receive a card then the first thing they should have done was check to see that they are on the register. If they were on the register, they were entitled to vote.”
Angus Laverty of An Post confirmed they had been made aware of the matter in the late evening of polling day (Thursday, June 12).
“We became aware of the situation late on the Thursday night,” he told Northside People.
“After a search we concluded that there was no record of us having received the polling cards for those areas.
“All the polling cards to be delivered would have been given to the sort office for circulation. However, we have no evidence of outstanding polling cards that were undelivered on our part.”
He added: “We are continuing to look into the matter.”

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