Submission on Public Consultation on the Control of Postering for Elections and Referenda

Submission on Public Consultation on the Control of Postering for Elections and Referenda

 

By Cllr Keith Martin BA(Hons), 33 Pairc na Coille, Westport, Mayo

 

Saturday, July 26, 2008

 

• The use of a political poster during an election or referendum campaign is a matter of freedom of speech and any attempt to curb the already restricted use of political postering would be an attack on democracy.
• Local Authorities already have the powers to punish those whose posters breach the litter laws.
• The vast majority of politicians and political parties take as much care and attention in removing their posters as they do in erecting them.
• The Posters of individual politicians and parties are re-used time and time again and are up-dated by means of stickers as in the Lisbon Campaign.
• I would suggest that 7 days is too short a period in which to remove posters from electoral areas in the West of Ireland where a single electoral area for example in Mayo can be bigger than County Louth.
• I do not accept that there is significant public concern about the scale and nature of postering that arises on foot of this exemption. This issue was not raised here in the local media during or after the recent Lisbon campaign.  There were no letters to the editor etc.  Mayo's population is over 100,000 and yet there was no concerns raised so I must reject the Minister's premise.
• In my own town of Westport, Co. Mayo all the political parties and organisations operate a "poster free" policy within the town boundary.  This means that our heritage/Tidy Town remains poster free during the electiosns.  However this is a purely optional arrangement and any effort to impose a legal ban on postering would be strongly opposed by all sides.
• Having invested heavily in posters to be re-used time and time again I am strongly opposed to having a ban placed on postering.  Indeed I have already purchased my posters for next year's elections at considerable expense in the reasonable expectation that I will be postering my electoral area and I wonder what liabilities the state will have if it brings in such a ban less than 12 months from an election?
• The idea of limiting the number of posters to a candidate is ridiculous as it does not take into account geography or situation.  For example in Mayo we have electoral wards bigger than county Louth, we have 4 seater and 7 seater areas of all sorts of different sizes.  This sounds like a Dublin 4 ideal which does not work when it is taken out of Dublin 4.
• I have no problem with using biodegradable poster materials or requiring recycling of posters or maximum sizes of posters and I would welcome local authorities in exercising their already sufficent existing powers in relation to posters and cable ties.
• I feel that is issue is more of a Public Relations exercise by the Minister than a necessary reform of the system.
• In conclusion I think the situation as it stands is a close to ideal and would like to stress that the right of politicans to poster is a historical and democratic right as well as an expression of freedom of speech and thought and any attempts to reign it will be opposed vigorously by those of use who put our names on the ballot paper and our faces on posters in an effort to make a change for the better in our local area.