[E-voting] Dublin North election count

[Michael McMahon]

I attended the Dublin North Dail election count on Friday and Saturday. 
I was there
for most of Friday, and parts of Saturday. I wrote a short report based 
on my observations
which if anyone would like to read it, can be found at: 
http://www.hexmedia.com/evoting/dnorthreport.pdf
It is mostly concerned with the procedures, rather than the details of 
what happened at each count.

This is the summary:

"In summary, the count seemed to go quite smoothly and efficiently, 
though it took two full days to complete.
One area of concern was the ballot boxes, which did not look 
particularly secure, and some of which
could have been already open before arriving at the initial tally 
tables. All of the counting was done
openly and transparently. The party tallies seemed to be accurate from 
an early stage,
predicting the result from half way through the first day. One recount 
was performed, resulting in
the reversal of the relevant elimination, but not affecting the overall 
result. The recount procedures
are very effective at validating the sets of ballots being checked. But 
the procedures are time-consuming,
and because only two candidates are being checked, they are unable to 
pick up errors in other candidates
ballot sets, which could affect the outcome of the recount. In this 
case, the recount resulted in a difference
of only 2 votes between the two candidates. An independently verifiable 
electronic voting and counting system
could potentially solve some of these problems. Different ballot boxes 
would solve the problem
with the ones used here."

- Michael.