The smouldering issue that was e-voting turned into an open flame on Tuesday, forcing the government to bow, ever so slightly, to concerns brought forward by Fine Gael, the Labour Party and the Greens. Sparking the most recent discourse on the matter on Tuesday night was a joint motion from all three major opposition parties that called on the government to immediately defer plans for the use of e-voting in the European and local elections this summer. Much, but not all, of the concern surrounding e-voting deals with the lack of paper trails that the new Nedap/Powervote machines will leave in the upcoming elections. It is thought that the "hard" evidence of paper printouts for each vote to authenticate election results are the only secure means to verify that e-voting machines have functioned properly and that results have not been tampered with.
If there was significant concern that elections were not carried out properly due to technical or other problems, then election results could be challenged in court -- an affair that would likely be costly, drawn-out and messy.
Tuesday night's concession from the government includes legislation for the introduction of an independent statutory panel that will verify the security of the system in advance of the June elections. The same group will then monitor the operation of the 6,500 e-voting machines in the upcoming elections, and all subsequent elections. Though the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, TD, has said that the new laws are not constitutionally required, his party will push the legislation through to be on the safe side.
It was also said that the new e-voting machines would allow for abstentions, an option previously unavailable to voters using the machines, though the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government has not made it clear how this will be done.
Fine Gael said on Tuesday night that the dispensations went nowhere near far enough. "The government is proposing a fig leaf of an independent panel while at the same time expressing their intention to press ahead with the full implementation of electronic voting in the local and European elections," Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny, TD, said in a written statement. "If the government were serious about the views of independent experts, it would suspend its plans for electronic voting in June."
Kenny said that proposed legislation was an admission by the government that it had failed to convince the public that e-voting can be trusted. "Their belated acknowledgement that new legislation is necessary simply highlights the incompetent way the entire process has been handled," he said. "This smoke and mirrors response totally fails to address the need for a voter-verified paper audit trail in order to confirm the accuracy of the counting process."
E-voting has long been a matter of concern since the machines were first used in some constituencies in 2002. But recently, the situation has exploded in Ireland -- where it has already been the subject of an intense Oireachtas Committee debate -- and in other democracies, with movements against such systems springing up and gaining strength with each passing week.
Quelle: Electric News Net, 18.02.2004
