The Electoral (Amendment) Act 2009 (No. 4) is a law of Ireland which amended

electoral law Election law is a branch of public law that relates to the democratic processes, election of representatives and office holders, and referendums, through the regulation of the electoral system, voting rights, ballot access, election managemen ...

, including revisions to

Dáil constituencies There are 39 multi-member electoral districts, known as Dáil constituencies, that elect 160 TDs (members of parliament), to Dáil Éireann, Ireland's lower house of the Oireachtas, or parliament, by means of the single transferable vote, to ...

and European Parliament constituencies in light of the 2006 census. The new European Parliament constituencies were used at the election in June 2009. The revision to Dáil constituencies took effect on the dissolution of the

30th Dáil 3 (three) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 2 and preceding 4, and is the smallest odd prime number and the only prime preceding a square number. It has religious or cultural significance in many societie ...

on 1 February 2011 and a

general election A general election is a political voting election where generally all or most members of a given political body are chosen. These are usually held for a nation, state, or territory's primary legislative body, and are different from by-elections ( ...

for the

31st Dáil 31 (thirty-one) is the natural number following 30 and preceding 32. It is a prime number. In mathematics 31 is the 11th prime number. It is a superprime and a self prime (after 3, 5, and 7), as no integer added up to its base 10 digits ...

on the revised constituencies took place on 25 February 2011.

Revision to constituencies

In April 2007, the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government established an independent

Constituency Commission The Constituency Commission ( ga, An Coimisiún um Thoghlaigh) is an independent commission in Ireland which advises on redrawing of constituency boundaries of Dáil constituencies for the election of members to Dáil Éireann (the lower house o ...

under the terms of the Electoral Act 1997. Its report proposed several changes to Dáil constituencies. The commission was chaired by Iarfhlaith O'Neill, judge of the High Court, and delivered its report later in 2007. The Act implemented the recommendations of this report and repealed the Electoral (Amendment) (No. 2) Act 1998, which had defined constituencies since the 2007 general election. The size of the Dáil remained at 166, arranged in 43 constituencies. The Dáil constituencies in this Act were repealed by the

Electoral (Amendment) (Dáil Constituencies) Act 2013 The Electoral (Amendment) (Dáil Constituencies) Act 2013 (No. 7) is a law of Ireland which revised Dáil constituencies in light of the 2011 census and a requirement to reduce the number of Dáil seats. The new constituencies took effect on t ...

, which created a new schedule of constituencies first used at the 2016 general election for the

32nd Dáil 3 (three) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 2 and preceding 4, and is the smallest odd prime number and the only prime preceding a square number. It has religious or cultural significance in many societie ...

held on 26 February 2016.

Electoral law amendments

The Act amended the provisions of the Electoral Act 1997 on the establishment of the Constituency Commission to provide that it would be established on the release of preliminary results of the census. This was in response to finding of the High Court in ''Murphy v. Minister for Environment'' (2007). It also amended the European Parliament Elections Act 1997 and the Local Elections Regulations to amend the provisions for the nomination of

Independent candidates An independent or non-partisan politician is a politician not affiliated with any political party or bureaucratic association. There are numerous reasons why someone may stand for office as an independent. Some politicians have political views th ...

. This was in response to the finding of the

Supreme Court A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts in most legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, apex court, and high (or final) court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...

in ''Cooney v. Minister for the Environment'' (2006).

Constituencies for the 31st Dáil

''Explanation of columns *Constituency: The name of the constituency. *Created: The year of the election when a constituency of the same name was last created. *Seats: The number of TDs elected from the constituency under the Act. *Change: Change in the number of seats since the last distribution of seats (which took effect in 2007).

Summary of changes

This table summarises changes in representation. It does not address revisions to the boundaries of constituencies. There were further boundary changes to 18 constituencies: Cork East, Cork North-Central, Cork North-West, Donegal North-East, Donegal South-West,

Dublin North Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 cen ...

, Dublin North-Central, Dublin North-East, Dublin South, Kerry South, Kildare North, Kildare South, Laois–Offaly, Meath East, Meath West, Roscommon–South Leitrim, Sligo–North Leitrim and Tipperary North.

European Parliament constituencies

The constituencies below replaced the constituencies which were in operation at the

2004 European Parliament election The 2004 European Parliament election was held between 10 and 13 June 2004 in the 25 member states of the European Union, using varying election days according to local custom. The European Parliamental parties could not be voted for, but electe ...

, with a reduction in the total number of seats from 13 to 12 in light of the increased size of the

European Parliament The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts ...

on the accession of

Bulgaria Bulgaria (; bg, България, Bǎlgariya), officially the Republic of Bulgaria,, ) is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern flank of the Balkans, and is bordered by Romania to the north, Serbia and North Maced ...

and

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Moldova to the east, and ...

to the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been ...

in 2007. They were in turn replaced by the European Parliament Elections (Amendment) Act 2014, with a reduced number of seats to 11 for the

2014 European Parliament election The 2014 European Parliament election was held in the European Union, from 22 to 25 May 2014. It was the 8th parliamentary election since the first direct elections in 1979, and the first in which the European political parties fielded candid ...

, following the accession of Croatia in 2013.

References

{{Constituency Law Ireland 2009 in Irish law Acts of the Oireachtas of the 2000s Electoral 2009 2011 Irish general election