136,000 entitled to vote for new president

Close to 136,000 Meath residents will be entitled to vote in tomorrow's (Thursday) presidential election and the referendums on judge's pay and Oireachtais inquiries. Meath voters are preparing to cast their votes in three different constituencies and 236 polling stations across the county in the first presidential election in 14 years. There will be a record seven candidates on the ballot paper for this year's election - Gay Mitchell (Fine Gael), Michael D Higgins (Labour), Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin) and independents Sean Gallagher, Mary Davis, David Norris and Dana Rosemary Scallon. The electorate will also be asked to vote on proposals to give the government powers to reduce judges' pay and on proposals to give the Dáil and the Seanad powers to conduct inquiries into matters of general public importance. Some 63,260 are registered to vote in Meath East and 61,389 in Meath West with 12,000 voters living in the very eastern portion of Meath now casting their ballots in the Louth constituency. Polling stations will be open from 7am to 10pm on Thursday and voters may be required to produce evidence of identity. Voting will be in the same polling stations people voted in last February in the general election. After the close of the polls, the ballot boxes used at each polling station will be conveyed to a count centre for the constituency concerned. The count centre for Meath East will be in the Donaghmore/Ashbourne GAA Centre in Ashbourne, while the Meath West count will take place in Trim GAA Centre. Votes cast in the Louth consituency will be counted in the Xerox complex in Dundalk. The returning officer for Meath is county registrar Mary O'Malley, who will oversee the Meath West count, while Trim solicitor Kevin Martin will oversee the count in Meath East, as acting returning officer. Boxes will be opened at 9am on Friday and the ballot papers for the presidential election will be counted first. Once the result of the presidential election has been ascertained, the count on the referendum on judges' remuneration will commence and this will be followed by the Houses of the Oireachtas Inquiries referendum. Count results for the referendums are not expected until Saturday. More than 500 people will be employed in polling stations around the county on Thursday and a further 80 counting staff will be engaged on Friday and Saturday in the count centres in Ashbourne and Trim.