Councillors calls for more efficient running of local elections

The outgoing Cathaoirleach of Mayo County Council has called for the local elections to be run more efficiently in future.

Cllr Michael Loftus said that the local authority will ‘have to look at seriously at how we do the counts in future’ after the last three councillors, including himself, were elected to the 30-seat council in the early hours of last Tuesday morning.

Tallying votes in all six local electoral areas in Mayo began on Saturday, June 8.

Two recounts in the Swinford LEA meant that counting in the Ballina LEA did not begin until Monday, June 10, and did not conclude until after 3am the following morning.

Speaking to The Mayo News after his election to Mayo County Council on the eleventh count, Cllr Loftus said: “It’s awful late that we’re all here tonight. That was one of the problems with the [Swinford LEA] count upstairs and it not getting the full attention that it should have. I feel that we have to look at that seriously how we do the counts in future to be fair to everybody.”

The Fianna Fáil councillor acknowledged the work of the council staff who worked at the count, saying they ‘deserve an awful lot of praise’ for their running of the election.

Counting took place in the Velvet Room and the Ruby Room in the TR Royal Hotel and Theatre and Castlebar, which was also used at the count centre for the Midlands North West European elections.

Counting for the European elections did not conclude until last Friday, almost a week after the first ballot boxes arrived at the Castlebar venue.

Local count centres

Independent councillor Mark Duffy said that future local elections should be run within individual local electoral areas with their own returning officers.

Counting for the now-defunct town councils took place in individual count centres within the locality.

Speaking to The Mayo News yesterday (Monday), Cllr Duffy said many people who worked and attended the count found the process ‘frustrating’.

“At times, there were hundreds of people in a room in a very tight, small space. I think from a public health point of view, it wasn’t optimum having the European count taking over the main hall which meant that you have two fairly small low ceiling places with not the best ventilation. I just think that it may be organised better if each municipal district should have their own counts,” said Cllr Duffy.

“People would have travelled across the whole country to be with family and friends, campaigns and candidates and had to return home because they thought it was going to begin,” he added, referring to the Ballina LEA count, which had been originally scheduled to take place on Sunday after the Swinford LEA was completed.

“I have to give credit to everyone who worked on it very professionally but I think we can do a lot to improve it.”