Irish Presidential Election 2011 cost taxpayer over €20m

The Presidential Election 2011 cost the taxpayer over €20m over the course of the campaign, with a significant amount due to postage costs.

Costs to the taxpayer included the election literature of each candidate, which cost approximately €11.63m, the reimbursement of €200,000 to three candidates who reached the 12.5% quota, and administrative costs involved on the day of the election.

A sum of approximately €14m was set aside to pay for expenses of running the election, such as the counting of votes and transportation of ballot boxes. The portion of this sum that was actually spent has yet to calculated by the Department of Finance.

Cuts were made to tackle the costs of the election last summer when Minister for the Environment Phil Hogan cut expenses that can be claimed by candidates from €260,000 to €200,000.

However, the costs of posting election literature were not significantly reduced.
Under the Constitution, each candidate at a presidential election is “entitled to send one election letter, free of postage charge, to each elector or to any combination of electors on the register of presidential electors.”

Dept of Finance said it secured a bulk discount of 11% from An Post for election leaflet delivery, but due to the number of candidates in the 2011 Presidential Election, costs still exceeded €11m, just €4m short of the cost of postage of literature for the General Election in 2007 – an election which involved over 450 candidates.

During the discussion for the Electoral (Amendment) Bill 2011 in June, Fianna Fáil Spokesperson for Public Expenditure and Reform Sean Fleming TD highlighted the issue.
“If the Government is serious about saving money on the election, it should amalgamate the material. It is a source of public aggravation that 30 items of literature are sometimes distributed to registered voters when one would suffice”, Fleming said at an Oireachtas meeting.

The suggestion to amalgamate the election manifesto of all candidates was echoed by Independent candidate Seán Gallagher in August, which he said could make up to €10m in savings.
“If all parties run candidates and another independent (Norris) enters the race, the cost to the State of seven runners would be €11.63 million. But if we all agree to issuing one leaflet through the postal system, it would be €1.66 million,” the runner-up claimed in his manifesto.

Candidates who reach the election quota of 12.5% can claim €200,000 from the State for expenses. President Higgins, Seán Gallager and Martin McGuinness reached this quota, costing €600,000 overall.

The remaining candidates; Dana Rosemary-Scallon, David Norris, Mary Davis and Gay Mitchell had to cover their own expenses.

Fine Gael candidate Mitchell, will be covered by his party. Fine Gael their headquarters on Mount Street remortgaged for €1m in order to pay for the campaign, which has a spending cap of €750,000 in place for all candidates.

President-elect Michael D Higgins, who took a 23.5% pay cut to bring his annual salary to €235,000, underwent knee-repair surgery in Galway on Tuesday, and will return to office on 19 December.
Ends….