North Meath loses out on council seats

NORTH Meath consisted of 30 per cent of the county yet will have just above a sixth of the county council"s membership after next June"s elections, complained Cllr John Farrelly at the Kells area meeting last Monday. Cllr Brian Collins said Kells had suffered further by being switched into the Meath east constituency for national elections, since this was part of a flawed imbalance, moving the county east and weakening communities. Changes to the Trim electoral division had a similar effect - as it had also lost a council seat. 'Longford has 24 councillors, with a population the same as north Meath', he added. Council returning officer Bill Sweeney said Kells area"s five remaining members would serve 5,310 voters each, but that was the lowest in the county and compared it to Trim"s 5,838, which was the highest. He said two polling stations in Kilbride were moving to Trim area while the Gibbstown/Donaghpatrick switch back into Navan moved 473 voters from Kells. The number of Kells area councillors had reduced from seven down to five, which made it very difficult to serve in such a large area, said Cllr Michael Lynch. The Kells switch made the local and national boundary changes a 'numbers game by Dublin people, who had no knowledge of the communities affected'. Councillors Bryan Reilly and Michael Gallagher agreed; the former saying all their submissions had no effect. Cllr Farrelly said the county"s constituencies should have been north and south, nor east and west. The switch of Kells to Meath East 'beggars belief and the bottom line to the boundary commissioners was to make it as handy as possible for civil servants,' he concluded.