Limerick people head to the polls to vote in two referendums

LIMERICK people are going to the polls for the first time in more than four years this Friday.

Polling stations across the city and county opened at 7am, as tens of thousands of people have their say on whether to accept or reject two proposed changes to the Constitution. Polling places will stay open until 10pm.

Upon arrival at polling stations - which remain largely unchanged from the 2020 general election - voters will be given two slips of paper in white and green.

The white sheet of paper will ask people to vote on the family amendment. In this there is one vote for two proposed changes.
The proposals involve the insertion of additional text to article 41.1.1 of the Constitution and the deletion of text in article 41.3.1.

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The green sheet of paper will ask people to vote on the care amendment. It proposes deleting articles 41.2.1 and 41.2.2 of the Constitution and inserting a new article, 42b.

These proposed changes can be found online at www.electoralcommission.ie/referendums, or by calling 01-888-2780.

Voters will be asked to vote yes or no to each proposal.

Irish citizens, aged 18 or over living in the State and on the electoral register are allowed to cast a vote.

If you are eligible to vote, you should have received a polling card in the post informing you of your local polling station.

If you do not receive a card, you can check your polling station by calling 061-556000 or by visiting www.checktheregister.ie

At the polling station, you are advised to bring some valid form of photographic identification.

After polling closes on Friday evening, ballot papers from across Limerick city and county will be transferred to the Limerick Racecourse.

Here, counting locally will begin at nine o’clock on Saturday morning.

The votes for Limerick will be counted on the basis of the Dail constituency boundaries.

Therefore, there will be two results from Limerick - from the city constituency and the county area.

The results from Limerick and the rest of the country will be fed up to Dublin Castle, at which stage details on how the vote locally went will be made available.

A national declaration is due by Saturday evening.

After this, the next time an election will take place in Limerick will likely be Friday, June 7. At this time, the local and European elections will take place, alongside the first ever election for an executive mayor for Limerick.