Politics in the Republic of Ireland 7th ed (published 2024): 'essential reading for anyone with even the slightest interest in Irish politics', as the marketing (perhaps just a little bit optimistically) says.

Dismantling of international aid body quite understandable: after all, why just ‘give’ money away? Merchant banker (as played by John Cleese) in Monty Python sketch had similar difficulty grasping the concept:

Belated note re recent 75th anniv of death of André Sainte-Laguë (18 Jan 1950). Mathematician (pioneer esp in field of graph theory), member of French resistance during WW2, devisor of even-handed (unlike D’Hondt) method of awarding seats to parties in proportion to their votes.

@wrafter_colin Cost/benefit of introducing this for Dáil elections less clear-cut; at that level there doesn’t seem to be a ‘problem’ that needs fixing, & there would certainly be some public resistance & suspicion. Whereas for Seanad panel seats, benefits are clear and no evident downside.

It seems proposed Regional Inds technical group would not be illegal nor violate standing orders. But that’s not really the issue. Surprising that FF & FG are so supportive of this dubious scheme given that their own backbenchers are among those who would be adversely affected.

Small N of votes at Seanad elns but takes long time to count them. Complexity of counting rules, with counts and sub-counts, inside & outside nominees, means computerised counting has big advantage over manual. And ballot papers are retained so can be checked in case of dispute.

@DonnchaLaw Small N of votes at Seanad elns but takes long time to count them. Complexity of counting rules, with counts and sub-counts, inside & outside nominees, means computerised counting has big advantage over manual. And ballot papers are retained so can be checked in case of dispute.

Gap between them widened from 31 at end of count yesterday to 64 today. Bearing in mind that counting errors can be expected to be random (ie as many will benefit one candidate as will benefit the other), that's a surprisingly large switch-around.

@AnMailleach Greens didn't run more than one candidate in any Dáil constituency, so this will be the only intra-Green transfer of the entire election.

1997 referendum was (presumably) well-intentioned in loosening absolute nature of 1992 judgment but, if it hadn’t happened, Supreme Court would now be free to give different interpretation of 28.4.2, one not based on ‘largely artificial premises’ in words of Gerard Hogan. 2/2

Taken literally, Art 28.4.3 implies, inter alia, that ministers can’t let their civil servants know how a deptal proposal was received by cabinet. And it’s not time-bound, implying that to reveal cabinet discussions even after lapse of 30 years may be in breach of article. 1/2

Just as well FF & FG leaders decided to use minister of state appointments to redress gender imbalance at cabinet level, otherwise who knows just how few women would have been appointed as junior mins.

Michael Moynihan (FF, Cork NW) appointed minister of state today 27+ years after first election as TD. Probably the longest apprenticeship ever served by a min of state / parl sec. For govt (cabinet) mins, Oliver J Flanagan’s was 33 years: elected as TD 1943, govt minister 1976.

@dkennytcd Yes, good point – the 1997 amendment (passed 53–47) made explicit an absolute confidentiality (except in very limited circumstances) that prior to 1992 judgment was at best implicit, maybe not even that. As @anmailleach says, Daly case & judgment will be v interesting.

The idea that only the 15 cabinet ministers can attend government meetings and that all cabinet discussions must be completely confidential among those 15 people is based largely on Supreme Court’s surprising 3-2 decision in 1992 in cabinet confidentiality case. 1/2

Increase in junior ministerial positions from 20 to 23 means that FF & FG now have 18 of these to divide between them. FF have 48 seats, FG 38, and both Sainte-Laguë and D’Hondt PR formulae point to FF 10, FG 8 as the fairest outcome here. With 19 it would have been FF 11, FG 8.

With Regional Inds having 4 of the 20 junior min positions, PR formula Sainte-Laguë (even-handed, unlike D’Hondt) would have allocated the remaining 16 by awarding 9 to FF and 7 to FG. So it looks as if it was FF that gave up one junior min position to bring Healy-Raes on board.

@Argyle Queen Margrethe, Mette Frederiksen, Hans Christian Andersen, Hamlet Prince of Denmark ... We gave your boys a hell of a beating!

@AnMailleach @Edward__Burke John Coakley is the authority on these matters. In Reforming Political Institutions (2013) p. 103 he refers to an old tradition of university seats in parliaments, with further reading suggested, but doesn’t state whether TCD is the oldest to have this representation.