Over-represented Dáil

Time Magazine

So our Bunreacht says we're have a TD for every 20,000-30,000 people and as is stands we clock in fairly close to the 25,000 mark. This means, ceteris paribus, that every big town has a TD. Given the recent boundary-changes, my dad is now bemoaning the fact that Leitrim could be left without a TD as they've split the county in two and adjoined with other counties.

We are pretty much the most over-represented parliamentary in the EU. Germany currently have 603 seats - 3.6 times as many as us - however their population, at well over 82m, is more than twenty times ours.

With such "local" national politics, is it any wonder our two major parties are split on local, often trivial issues and fail to have any major idealogical clashes?

Let's try and keep to the more theory-based approach here (though discussions of practicalities re: constitution and so on are not forbidden), I put it to ye that we should halve the number of TDs to 1 per 50,000, slightly increase number of town councils and county councillors and give greater freedom to said local councils. Thoughts?

Villain

Its a difficult one, on one hand I think using the population numbers to determine the location of TD's makes sense i.e. people are well represented.

On the other hand I think perhaps it should be geographical with major cities getting extra seats e.g. the number of TD's in each county should determined by the size of that county and then each City gets extra TD's depending on the size of the city. If caluclated correctly this might see a more even spread of TD's in under populated areas.

All politics is local so while reducing the number of TD's may help remove some of the local issues which divide parties I doubt it will remove many. It may also lead to people becoming more disenfranchised and result in a fall of voter turnout.

Just my quick 2 cents.

Cronus333

The reason why we have so many TDs is because Lemass found that there were too few people in the Dail to pick cabinet ministers.

A dail too small doesn't leave enough scope for change and enough fresh faces to make picking a new cabinet viable.

flogen

Cronus333 wrote:

The reason why we have so many TDs is because Lemass found that there were too few people in the Dail to pick cabinet ministers.

A dail too small doesn't leave enough scope for change and enough fresh faces to make picking a new cabinet viable.

Aye, if more politicians are working in regional councils instead of the national parliament it decreases the availability of talent (and most importantly, relevant talent).
That said I haven't given the issue too much thought, but given that we're such a small country, wouldn't bringing more issues to local level just create more problems (a further lack of national coherance, which is something the Irish government has only recently realised is needed)

Healio

Dont the germans have 16 self-governing states aswell??

I think at least 4-5 seats per constituency are needed to make sure there is a somewhat proportionate representation of peoples preferences. I don't think the realtionship between population size and sufficient representation is necessarily a linear one. A reduced number of seats would tend to hit minority parties and minority preferences harder.

If we want de-localise national politics, a good move might to give power back to local authorities rather than reducing the size of the parilament.

If we really want to cut down on the number of paid public representatives, why not just get rid of the Seanad, it's not a particularly useful or powerful body at the moment anyway.

gandalf

Not the first time this has been muted here.

http://89.234.66.107/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=36665

On top of reducing the number of TD's I think it has gotten to the stage where people should vote for a party and not an individual. And then when the number of seats has been decided the parties fill them with the people they feel are the most appropriate to the jobs from their party ranks. Removes all the local crap like you have with Cullen in Waterford where he only gets reelected cause they have "a Minister".

Cronus333

gandalf wrote:

Not the first time this has been muted here.

http://82.195.136.250/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=36665

On top of reducing the number of TD's I think it has gotten to the stage where people should vote for a party and not an individual. And then when the number of seats has been decided the parties fill them with the people they feel are the most appropriate to the jobs from their party ranks. Removes all the local crap like you have with Cullen in Waterford where he only gets reelected cause they have "a Minister".

Especially since Ahern has fixed it so every constituency (except Kildare North, which has no government TD, and Dublin North Central, because of the Ivor Callely fiasco) has a minister.....

ISAW

Ibid wrote:

So our Bunreacht says we're have a TD for every 20,000-30,000 people and as is stands we clock in fairly close to the 25,000 mark. This means, ceteris paribus, that every big town has a TD. Given the recent boundary-changes, my dad is now bemoaning the fact that Leitrim could be left without a TD as they've split the county in two and adjoined with other counties.

they split Dublin into eleven or twelve constituencies. they also split it into four counties.

We are pretty much the most over-represented parliamentary in the EU. Germany currently have 603 seats - 3.6 times as many as us - however their population, at well over 82m, is more than twenty times ours.

German is a Federal Republic. the federal parliaments (similar to say a proverance in Ireland) have parliamentary powers (like States in the US do). Much more than N Ireland or scotland for example. They can tax and have court systems and their own police/administration etc.

If you add up all that in the Us or in Germany it runs into thousands of TD's.

With such "local" national politics, is it any wonder our two major parties are split on local, often trivial issues and fail to have any major idealogical clashes?

But in the US and Germany they HAVE national parties with local influence.

Let's try and keep to the more theory-based approach here (though discussions of practicalities re: constitution and so on are not forbidden), I put it to ye that we should halve the number of TDs to 1 per 50,000, slightly increase number of town councils and county councillors and give greater freedom to said local councils. Thoughts?

i.e. federalise. But if so why not allow local regional councils to tax people?

By "freedom" do you mean authority?

If you want redical reform why not get rid of the opposition system? Say you allow the Taoiseach to appoint the cabinet from whoever he wants (as long as they are Irish citizens say). then have the Dail committees become the opposition. This would put un elected people into ministries and have elected people work together to hold them up to scrutiny.

oscarBravo

Cronus333 wrote:

Especially since Ahern has fixed it so every constituency (except Kildare North, which has no government TD, and Dublin North Central, because of the Ivor Callely fiasco) has a minister.....

Which Mayo TD is a minister?

ISAW

oscarBravo wrote:

Which Mayo TD is a minister?

Dublin North ( glennon is retiring and he is only a chair of a committee) ? Dublin North East? dondgal NE (hasnt Mc Daid retired?) Actually the constitution says ther are fifteen ministers. But arent there are 45 constituencies?

Mick86

Ibid wrote:

So our Bunreacht says we're have a TD for every 20,000-30,000 people and as is stands we clock in fairly close to the 25,000 mark. This means, ceteris paribus, that every big town has a TD.

Too many TDs who are overpaid and underworked. The country could be run by a large committee.

300 million Americans are represented by 435 Representatives.

Cronus333

I honestly overlooked Mayo, and I thought Woods and Glennon were junior ministers.....

johnnyskeleton

Why not scrap the seanad instead?

I'm not saying that they don't perform any function whatsoever, but I would suggest that even the most insignificant TD plays a greater role in our democracy than the most important seanador.

But I don't think reducing the size of the dail will have any real benefit to anybody. You need a certain number of people to have a viable parliament, say 100 members, and the more extra seats you have, in our system of PR, the more room there is for minor parites and lesser voices.

I think the real problem is that the party system is too strict in Ireland - we never have the backbench rebellions to the extent they have in England. So a vote for any FF candidate is a vote for its leader, and so on. If you accept that as the unchanging reality, then I suppose less numbers makes sense (i.e. the only people that really need to be TDs are Berty, Enda and Pat).

Spyral

100 TDs would be enough for the country

Grudaire

But the real question is what do all these extra TD's do?

I was in the Dail, and three TD's were there politly agreeing on some irrellivant Bill, the rest assumadly doing something better??

Bubs101

We probably have far too much TD's for our population size but at elections, the system leads for far more entertaining politics and local TD rivalries

Victor

Cronus333 wrote:

Especially since Ahern has fixed it so every constituency (except Kildare North, which has no government TD, and Dublin North Central, because of the Ivor Callely fiasco) has a minister.....

43 constituencies, 15 ministers and 18 junior ministers.

Cliste wrote:

But the real question is what do all these extra TD's do? I was in the Dail, and three TD's were there politly agreeing on some irrellivant Bill, the rest assumadly doing something better??

Most work from their offices, which have CCTV of the Dáil / Seanad.

brianthebard

Mick86 wrote:

Too many TDs who are overpaid and underworked. The country could be run by a large committee.

300 million Americans are represented by 435 Representatives.

?
Are you just counting senators and governors? Each state has representatives within themselves, basically, the same way our government operates within the EU.