Taoiseach Bertie Ahern strongly defended electronic voting and derided traditional manual voting as "our silly aul' system".
He told the Dáil that the only problem with electronic voting equipment purchased by the State was the software, which was being corrected at a cost of €500,000. "We have to correct the software which takes a half-a-million and then try to move forward. Otherwise we go into the 21st century in this country, being the laughing stock with our stupid aul' pencils".
He was responding to Labour leader Pat Rabbitte who had criticised comments by Minister for the Environment Dick Roche, who told TV3 television at the weekend that the machines would be used in elections and referendums after 2007.
Mr Rabbitte said that the system had cost €52 million. "We could not use it because it was not reliable and it costs us almost €1 million a year to store it in various centres around the country," he added.
The report of the Commission on Electronic Voting had concluded that the machines "were not of sufficient quality to enable their use to be confidently recommended and that functional testing revealed programming errors", said Mr Rabbitte.
He also referred to the actions of a group in the Netherlands who had hacked into the system and declared that the hardware was not secure.
The Taoiseach said, however, that "what happened in Holland is that the anti-electronic campaign group in the Netherlands physically hacked into a machine to demonstrate security flaws and I suppose if you hacked into a ballot box you could do that too".
When Mr Rabbitte intervened the Taoiseach said "you were totally in favour of electronic voting until the result of the last election". The government of the Netherlands has stated publicly that this had no implications for the forthcoming elections, he said.
"I noted from their media editorials this morning, which I was given, that that is the view of their national media as well."
Mr Ahern said that the overall conclusion of the commission's report was that "the system chosen for our country can potentially enhance and deliver real efficiency in the administration of elections and the commission concluded that it could recommend the voting counting equipment in elections, subject to further work that it had recommended".
Mr Rabbitte said, however, that "if they're as good as the Taoiseach says, why aren't we using them in the election.
"What's the point in telling us that the software doesn't work. It's like saying that the chassis of a car is in perfect condition but the engine doesn't work." He said that if the voting equipment was not to be used in the general election "is the implication that it's all right to use it in the European election but not in the general election".
Mr Ahern said that the commission was satisfied "that the hardware which cost the money could work and operate effectively". Mr Ahern quoted an editorial in a Dutch paper " 'a return to the system of paper and red pencil sounds romantic but it's only a spurious solution since fraud is possible in any system'."
"As Deputy Rabbitte knows thousands of votes in our elections that are non-stamped take away the democratic franchise of the electorate, which proves that our silly aul' system is outdated."
