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Election records

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  • 13-07-2019 8:30am
    #1
    1874
    Registered Users Posts: 2,382 ✭✭✭


    Are there specifics of local elections kept for viewing? ie can anyone, an elected politician, an unelected person view election results to see how people voted or are the records kept for other reasosn? ie statistics?


    Im mainly wondering if a politician can see if in fact anyone voted for them and how, ie 1st preference or second preference and so on?
    not who voted for them, I know that part is secret.


    I see that it could be possible to isolate if anyone on a set street voted for Mr or Ms X politician, as when I go to vote, its done by set streets.


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    #2
    KevRossi
    Registered Users Posts: 4,381 ✭✭✭KevRossi


    They have people doing a tally at each box, so they know that they got a certain % of the vote out of a particular box. It is known which streets/townlands are covered by which boxes so they can work off this.

    The tally is an unofficial count, the election results only cover a whole electoral area.

    Tallies are shared among parties in my experience.

    When canvassing a good canvasser will note the reaction at a house to a certain candidate and will work off this as well.

    Going from this a politician will have an idea if a certain area votes for them or not and can decide what to do with this information. There was a famous incident about 10 years when a politician in the Fermoy Mitchelstown area refused to do something requested of him as he never got votes in that area.


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    #3
    Larbre34
    Registered Users Posts: 23,797 ✭✭✭✭Larbre34


    1874 wrote: »

    I see that it could be possible to isolate if anyone on a set street voted for Mr or Ms X politician, as when I go to vote, its done by set streets.

    I was an election official for 20 odd years, there is no way this is possible.

    The purpose of the register is to facilitate each person to vote and ensure that no one votes who is not entitled to and that nobody votes more than once.

    There are up to about 800 voters registered at each polling station (table), there is no possible way to link back a particular ballot paper to a particular voter to determine who voted for whom.

    AFAIK paper election records are held for about 7 years then destroyed, but if its the breakdown of each count you want from the local and European elections they are all available online.


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    #4
    1874
    Registered Users Posts: 2,382 ✭✭✭1874


    Larbre34 wrote: »
    I was an election official for 20 odd years, there is no way this is possible.

    The purpose of the register is to facilitate each person to vote and ensure that no one votes who is not entitled to and that nobody votes more than once.

    There are up to about 800 voters registered at each polling station (table), there is no possible way to link back a particular ballot paper to a particular voter to determine who voted for whom.

    AFAIK paper election records are held for about 7 years then destroyed, but if its the breakdown of each count you want from the local and European elections they are all available online.


    I think you are misunderstanding me, I am not asking if its possible to link a persons secret ballot to them, Im referring to numbers and first preferences or not, so I'll go off what you have replied with, you state that each polling station (table) may have x number of votes, the example you mention is 800 and you call each table a station, SO, would anyone (but Im mainly referring to a politician) be able to ascertain if X number of people from any particular table (ie certain streets) gave them a vote, a first preference vote or any other preference?
    The polling stations are isolated by road names, so Im wondering if that kind of record is available?? If I go to a recently elected local Politician with a query, can they look up the records to see if anyone voted for them in a particular station? will they be able to isolate their votes (number and preference) by street name? Im not suggesting they could determine who I voted for, but if I said I voted for a certain politician and then they look it up and say they got no first preferences can they know?


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    #5
    Larbre34
    Registered Users Posts: 23,797 ✭✭✭✭Larbre34


    1874 wrote: »
    would anyone (but Im mainly referring to a politician) be able to ascertain if X number of people from any particular table (ie certain streets) gave them a vote, a first preference vote or any other preference?
    The polling stations are isolated by road names, so Im wondering if that kind of record is available?? If I go to a recently elected local Politician with a query, can they look up the records to see if anyone voted for them in a particular station? will they be able to isolate their votes (number and preference) by street name? Im not suggesting they could determine who I voted for, but if I said I voted for a certain politician and then they look it up and say they got no first preferences can they know?

    KevRossi is right, the only way this may be recorded is the tallies taken by the people working for the parties/candidates, i.e. someone standing over Box No. 352 as it is opened and looking for No.1s for their candidate as the ballots are flattened and stacked. I wouldn't call it a 'record', it is not accurate, it can just indicate a trend. The politician or party in question may still have the hand-written tally sheets, but I don't see why they would keep them, they probably feed into a party spreadsheet or something.

    On the official election count side, there is no track kept of such things, all the votes are pooled for the constituency count once each box has been opened and reconciled.


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    #6
    L1011
    Moderators, Business & Finance Moderators, Motoring & Transport Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 67,653 Mod ✭✭✭✭L1011


    Most tallies are available as shared spreadsheets, not all. And some areas are never tallied.

    My area is boxed alphabetically so you do get clusters of an estate to a box more or less - but also similarly named areas nowhere nearby mixed together. My estate has every road stating with a different letter


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    #7
    blanch152
    Registered Users Posts: 27,192 ✭✭✭✭blanch152


    Larbre34 wrote: »
    I was an election official for 20 odd years, there is no way this is possible.

    The purpose of the register is to facilitate each person to vote and ensure that no one votes who is not entitled to and that nobody votes more than once.

    There are up to about 800 voters registered at each polling station (table), there is no possible way to link back a particular ballot paper to a particular voter to determine who voted for whom.

    AFAIK paper election records are held for about 7 years then destroyed, but if its the breakdown of each count you want from the local and European elections they are all available online.


    That is not strictly true.

    Say Bono rocks up to vote in Killiney. Election official hands him a ballot paper. Each ballot paper is numbered. Election official takes note in his head of the last four numbers of the ballot paper and commits them to memory.

    Following day count starts. Election official tells tallyman which box Bono voted in and which number ballot paper was his. Tallyman looks out for number and if he spots it as it is being laid out by count official, he can tell who Bono voted for.

    Why anyone would do this is beyond me, but it is technically possible. However, it would not be possible for more than one or two people per ballot box and at that scale it would require a conspiracy that would involve too many people to succeed, but if a few people just had a prurient interest in how Bono voted......


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    #8
    Larbre34
    Registered Users Posts: 23,797 ✭✭✭✭Larbre34


    Yes you're quite right, that could be done.

    However, as the ballot papers only have a serial number in the middle of the reverse side and Tallymen should (emphasise should) only be shown the ballot unfolded and face up when they are laid out on the tables, it would take at least 4 people in a conspiracy and a very obvious slow search by two count staff involved in it at the initial box opening stage to make it happen


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