I’ve already moaned about the Irish government’s failure to provide overseas constituents with a vote, but how about their failure on home turf?

Irish voters outside of the country are kept at arms length from democracy, but that’s not all. If you’re outside your own constituency voting could cost you an arm and a leg.

RTE’s Tom Grealish on his €100 journey to the polling-box.

Initial reports, good weather, and possibly a desire for change all point towards a high voter turnout in polling yesterday.

PA are saying ‘up to two thirds’ may have cast their vote. Looking forward to seeing how many new young voters got rocked by the controversial youth campaign, Rock the Vote. and the geriatric Rocking Chair the Vote campaign (Older and Bolder).

As we await the results, here’s something to chew on. Australia’s turnout figures:

Now that’s what I call participatory democracy.

(Ireland’s turnout figures roughly correspond to the situation in Australia in 1910)

Source

It’s official. I’ve entered for the Sydney marathon. There’s just 120 days left until it kicks off, so it’s time to get into training.

To start with, I’m joining the Irish madness team in the MS Sydney 16km walk next Sunday, to ease myself into it. Funds raised from the event go to Australia’s Multiple Sclerosis society, a hugely worthwhile cause.

For those of you unsure about MS, it’s a disease of the nervous system that gradually degrades your synapses, causing paralysis, dementia, loss of motor function and cognition, and ending pretty badly. My mum, God bless her, died from MS a few years back, and the Irish MS Society were fantastic, they couldn’t do enough to help her, and us, while she was ill.

Even a $10 donation helps (and if you’re donating in Euro, that’s around the same price as a city centre pint). My donation page is up and running – click the pic of me running for MS in the Dublin marathon to donate.

This should do it for you.

East coast mornings. Ahhhhhh.

Max McGuinness, writing for the Dubliner, is also giving out about his inability to vote, and he’s back in Ireland. He spent the last six months in Engurland, so he is ineligible, and rightly says that it is ‘frustrating and ridiculous’.

I’ve rattled on about it here already.  How about some movement on this before the 2009 European Parliament elections?