Time to randomise names on polling papers?

It was amusing to see my local council ballot paper this morning - first name on the paper (alphabetical, of course) was the candidate who had to withdraw because she got "go-away" money from a developer.

There would 100% be accusations of rigging the order of the ballot

You fix a problem that doesn’t exist and create a brand new one

They need to get bigger booths.

My slip was twice as long as the kittle shelf I had to lean on. Was quite awkward.

It's an interesting proposition but I'd like to see a bullet proof, guaranteed no interference randomisation process.

I agree about people being at a disadvantage due to the number standing for election.

I'm not sure it's just those at the bottom though.

I have a sneaking suspicion that quite a few voters only went to the 5th or 6th preference who if there were only 10 or 11 on the ballot paper would have gone all the way down.

Maybe print 2 columns to make it easier to see all candidates.

Honestly though, 27 candidates is nuts. Maybe require a certain threshold of council support or TD support like for presidential elections.

Two column ballot papers cause huge increases in spoiled votes and also people voting for the entirely wrong person

I would say definitely, i still have a Yellow Pages directory, and a lot of the listings start with AA, AAA, AAAA etc.

Random listing would eliminate any morons, and there has to be some who just go 1234 from the top down.

And a bit open to passers by.

Evidence?

i wonder do they select a few random orders and do them in batches or is every one random.

with 10 candidates there's 3.6 million possible orders

The fianna fail third choice candidate in MNW was second from top on the ballot and could benefit from the civil war / 'party first' vote.

Although having said that, their three candidates were in the first seven of a 27 strong field... These lads know what they're doing

I've been thinking about this for a few days now and so far I haven't come up with any major negatives.

Would it be an idea to send out a "dummy" voting paper(s) along with our polling cards?

It would give people a chance to study all the candidates an and do searches etc on the unfamiliar ones (even though some this time don't even seem to exist on the internet).

Voters could familiarise themselves where the candidates are on the paper or even fill it in and bring it with them and transfer them to the official voting paper in the polling station. It would be handy for elections with a stupid amount of candidates like today.

Once I got to around #14 today I couldn't remember who I wanted to give my lowest preferences to as many of them were unfamiliar to me. If I already had a copy with me I could have the paper filled in in a couple of minutes.

I don't think there would be an issue with privacy or GDPR as your "homework" is in your possession at all times.

Thoughts?

The ballot topper for the local elections in Ashbourne had supposedly changed his name to Ashbourne-Loftus due to his love of the town. I wonder if he'd have done the same if running in Wicklow or Westport.

That is the evidence.

There's 48 TDs from A→D, 49 if O Cuiv did manage that trick to get up the ballot; out of 160.

The distribution of surnames in this country does not support that being proportional, particularly with the significant concentration of surnames beginning with M (Murphy which is far and away the most common surname; any Mc variant) and O

This 1901 list has numbers; yes its a significant amount of time ago but the top ten is still mostly the same now so things really haven't changed much.

https://www.barrygriffin.com/surname-maps/irish-tops/Ireland/1901/

https://extra.ie/2023/01/07/news/irish-news/irelands-most-common-surname-revealed

1901: Murphy, Kelly, Walsh, Ryan, Sullivan, Byrne, O'Brien, Doyle, Reilly, Gallagher

2021: Murphy, Kelly, Ryan, Walsh, Byrne, O'Brien, O'Connor, O'Sullivan, McCarthy, and Doyle.

From tallying, people voting 1→X down the ballot is exceptionally rare, but people voting for their favoured candidate(s)/party and then filling the rest in alphabetically is common enough; as is someone voting 1-2-3 for a specific party in alphabetical order. But you're going to demand evidence of that now too, even though its absolutely impossible to provide, aren't you?

Take a look at areas with 3 or more same party candidates today - lots of FF, FG, SF; some Aontu and Labour - and there'll be a pattern again.

Wow, 30 years I have been eligible to vote, and I literally just found out yesterday the candidates are in alphabetical order 😂

I have never looked or taken any notice of their order! Seems so obvious now...….....

Would be an interesting experiment to run the next Euros in reverse alphabetical order and make it known well in advance. Just to see 1) what the candidate names all are and if there is any significant weighting change and 2) whether those with later alphabetical surname candidates do better than previously.

First time voter in this house printed off the list of candidates from local authority and returning officer websites and brought their marked list with them. Seems a bit over the top be sending more paper to EVERYONE when only a minority of people will use this.

I'm delighted about that too, it's not really relevant here.

It's not the yellow pages though, it's an election. We'd need fairly solid evidence to justify changing the current system.

We really shouldn't be thinking about turning the current system upside down based on a single snapshot. Has this trend been steady over time. Did these candidates really get an advantage, if you look at their experience levels, their party support, the broad expectation of whether they get elected or not.

I've tallied multiple general and local elections. I don't recall ballots filled out mostly in alphabetical order as being a thing at all at all.

The bould Beverly kept the 'Cooper' addition long after she ditched Mr Cooper.

Photo credit to https://electionsireland.org/images/posters/2002general/mayo.cfm

I'm not so sure the age of the publication matters all that much. Voting by writing 1, 2, 3 etc on a piece of paper is one of the few areas where the nature of the problem, and the technology has hardly changed. I would argue that alphabetical voting might be more of an issue in an era whan there are 20+ names on a ballot paper compared with the good old days when there were generally far fewer candidates.

But yes, fair dues to Brendan Walsh (and his co-author), a really great mind.

Yes , very good post !

Is it so hard to read a list of people albeit a long list , and then number them based on preference ? No , it's not .

Were people waiting to decide as they put their numbers on the sheet ?

Surely people had their preferences worked out before going in to vote ?

If not I can only say there is something seriously amiss with the electorate .and op we may as well tell.people how to vote if we don't order ballot papers alphabetically .

1,2,3,4,4 is not identifiable and would be accepted up to 3

Read the rules and the 2015 supreme court judgement