Taxpayers’ cash ‘wasted on e-voting screw-ups’

FINE Gael has accused the Government of wasting more taxpayers’ money on electronic voting after it emerged containers bought to house the machines were too small to hold all of them.

“The juggernaut of Fianna Fáil e-voting waste trundles on, with taxpayers’ cash now being wasted on brand new screw-ups,” said the party’s environment spokesman Fergus O’Dowd.

Last year, the Government announced it would move the 7,504 machines to Gormanston Army Camp. They were being stored by returning officers in each constituency, who rented or acquired space for the purpose. The Government paid the bill of about €700,000 a year and, by moving the machines to Gormanston, hoped to reduce this.

But last April, the Environment Department admitted Gormanston wouldn’t have room to store all 7,504 machines. As revealed by the Irish Examiner yesterday, the containers bought for the purpose wouldn’t have been able to hold all of them in any case.

Private briefing papers for Finance Minister Brian Cowen said: “The containers cannot accommodate the number of machines that had been anticipated. The ancillary equipment [such as tilt tables and hand trucks] is also taking up more space than had been envisaged.”

That means 2,804 machines will be stored in their existing locations for now.

Mr O’Dowd said: “Almost €1 million annually is being spent to meet the costs in storing the machines separately in each constituency as well as the guts of €60m wasted on the overall scheme. Fianna Fáil’s solution was to move all the machines to a centralised location but now we find the location set aside for this purpose can only house 62% of the machines.

The machines were used on a pilot basis in the 2002 General Election and the second Nice Referendum that same year. They were scrapped after the Independent Commission on Electronic Voting said it did not have confidence in them.