About 170,000 of the roughly 500,000 people whose names have been deleted from the electoral register may be entitled to vote, according to official estimates.
People whose names have been taken off the register now have another two weeks to get in touch with their local authorities to get listed, following the decision of the Minister for the Environment Dick Roche to extend the deadline.
On the basis of information provided by local authorities, officials in the Department of the Environment estimate that of the 505,042 people taken off the register, about 170,000 were removed because there was no contact with a household.
The other 335,000 names were deleted because they had died, moved house or had been registered at more than one address. There are just over three million names on the draft register.
The areas with the biggest number of deletions were Dublin city, Co Cork, south Dublin, Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown and Wicklow. Some of those areas also had a significant number of additions, with the biggest gap between deletions and additions coming in south Dublin.
Local authorities have told the department that there has been a significant response rate to the letters sent out recently and the registration campaign.
Dublin city officials expect that up to 20 per cent of those deleted - about 10,000 names - could be included in the final register, while Co Cork has reported that they have received about 6,000 corrections to their 40,000 deletions.
Officials in south Dublin estimate that about a third of their deletions - 13,000 names - could be included on the final register, while Fingal expects that some of about 3,000 deletions will be included.
All local authorities have reported a huge number of queries, with a significant volume being generated by www.checktheregister.ie, which has had some 100,000 hits since going live on November 1st.
Officials have noted that the level of deletions of deceased people varies widely across the country and is running well ahead of what might be expected if the register had been kept up to date.
They accept that the problem is due to the fact that people who had died in previous years were still on the register after February of this year. For instance, in Dublin city 13 per cent of deletions are attributed to death, while in Waterford the figure is 30 per cent of deletions.
The figures also show that major urban local authorities have a lower level of voter registration than the more suburban or rural council areas.
The figures are 80 per cent in Dublin city, 87 per cent in Cork, 76 per cent in Galway, 81 per cent in Limerick and just 67 per cent in Waterford.
The whole issue will be debated in the Dáil on Tuesday when the Minister brings in amending legislation to provide for the extension of the deadline.
He has agreed to accept an amendment from Labour's Eamon Gilmore that will allow councils to publish the list of deleted names, regardless of the Data Protection Act.
Mr Gilmore said yesterday that it was important to have an additional promotion campaign so that those who were not registered were made aware.
Additions and deletions: council breakdown
CITY COUNCILS..... DELETED SINCE FEB ....... ADDED SINCE FEB
Cork ...14,024 ... 8,418
Dublin 57,868 ... 43,478
Galway 8,813 ... 9,579
Limerick 8,622 ... 4,514
Waterford 4,562 ... 922
COUNTY COUNCILS
Carlow 5,818 ... 4,892
Cavan 6,308 ... 6,373
Clare 17,073 ... 14,489
Cork 40,530 ... 40,578
Donegal 19,768 ... 15,214
Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown 21,908 ... 14,432
Fingal 33,382 ... 32,658
Galway 13,489 ... 13,886
Kerry 9,178 ... 7,993
Kildare 21,600 ... 13,122
Kilkenny 8,839 ... 7,992
Laois 5,120 ... 4,075
Leitrim 3,923 ... 2,828
Limerick 11,533 ... 11,290
Longford 3,170 ... 2,706
Louth 11,892 ... 15,689
Mayo 12,406 ... 8,969
Meath 23,721 ... *
Monaghan 9,396 ... 4,510
North Tipperary 15,850 ... 10,114
Offaly 8,433 ... 7,127
Roscommon 3,632 ... 2,697
Sligo 4,141 ... 4,805
South Dublin 40,903 ... 21,831
South Tipperary 14,552 ... 9,886
Waterford 5,318 ... 4,339
Westmeath 5,860 ... 5,755
Wexford 13,660 ... 11,921
Wicklow 19,750 ... 12,312
Totals 505,042 ... 379,394
* Meath County Council is currently processing all of its additions to the register
