The fact that the General Election is to be held on a Thursday will make it impossible for thousands of students across the country to vote.
Up to 30 per cent of students are studying away for home. They will have to make the conscious decision to travel back to their home constituencies on 24 May if they want to vote. The chances of that happening on a Thursday are not high, as they may be required to be back in college on the following day.
Ideally, weekend voting would make most sense to maximise voter turnout. Even voting on a Friday, as a compromise, would have allowed people coming home for the weekend to get back and vote on a Friday evening.
The Taoiseach has continuously refused to give any coherent and pragmatic reason as to why he is insisting on having polling day on a Thursday. Who knows, perhaps it suits him to reduce the number of students likely to vote?
Students do have the option of applying for a postal vote if they are studying away from home and can show a valid reason for not being able to travel home to vote.
However the criteria and the time constraint under which students have to make an application for a postal vote make it almost impossible for students to get registered.
In order for a student to get a postal vote, the completed application form has to be in within 48 hours of the election being called.
That deadline passed on Tuesday. So for students it was almost impossible to successfully get their application together and posted in time, within 24 hours.
The problem was compounded by calling the election on a Sunday morning, as even the most prepared of students probably did not have enough time to successfully fill out their application form and post it within 24 hours, in order to get their application in within the 48-hour deadline.
This postal vote application procedure is crazy and results in many people, not only students, being disenfranchised and prevented from voting. It needs to be reviewed, as does the day of the week most suitable for voting.
Simon Coveney is a Fine Gael TD and MEP. He is writing a weekly column for Metro Eireann
Ideally, weekend voting would make most sense to maximise voter turnout. Even voting on a Friday, as a compromise, would have allowed people coming home for the weekend to get back and vote on a Friday evening.
The Taoiseach has continuously refused to give any coherent and pragmatic reason as to why he is insisting on having polling day on a Thursday. Who knows, perhaps it suits him to reduce the number of students likely to vote?
Students do have the option of applying for a postal vote if they are studying away from home and can show a valid reason for not being able to travel home to vote.
However the criteria and the time constraint under which students have to make an application for a postal vote make it almost impossible for students to get registered.
In order for a student to get a postal vote, the completed application form has to be in within 48 hours of the election being called.
That deadline passed on Tuesday. So for students it was almost impossible to successfully get their application together and posted in time, within 24 hours.
The problem was compounded by calling the election on a Sunday morning, as even the most prepared of students probably did not have enough time to successfully fill out their application form and post it within 24 hours, in order to get their application in within the 48-hour deadline.
This postal vote application procedure is crazy and results in many people, not only students, being disenfranchised and prevented from voting. It needs to be reviewed, as does the day of the week most suitable for voting.
Simon Coveney is a Fine Gael TD and MEP. He is writing a weekly column for Metro Eireann
