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The presumption of 24/7 availability is probably best summed up in the old story of a local TD who got a phone call as he was sitting down to Christmas dinner.

“Do you know what day it is?” he asked

“Christmas Day,” came the reply.

“Do you know what time it is?” he followed up.

“Dinner time,” was the answer.

“So why would you ring me just now?”

“Because I knew I’d get you in.”

While we’ve all written the headlines and stories about empty Dáil Chambers during a debate, there hasn’t been too much coverage of those Saturday morning clinics as elected representatives traipse from lounge to community hall to listen to constituents and their belief of their entitlements.

But then that’s what they voluntarily signed up for – and in fairness, if it’s an issue for them, they know there’s no point in complaining about it.

As someone who knows me well once told me, I’d be no good running for election because I can’t cope with rejection.

That’s slightly overstating it but having seen up close the fine line between winning a seat and losing your job, you have to admire people who put their name on the ballot paper.

I remember an election count in Westmeath where the then-Minister Mary O’Rourke failed to retain her seat and she had to bear her loss in a packed count centre before some kind soul found her a small office where she could come to terms with the very public loss of her job.

I remember watching on television when Nora Owen became the first and most public victim of the ill-fated electronic voting system when she stood in line with fellow candidates for what she thought was the result of the first count – only to find that the machines had counted everything in one go, and she’d lost her seat.

We’ll be going to the polling booths in Galway West again shortly to elect a successor to the President Catherine Connolly, so political anoraks will get their fix – and last week An Coimisiún Toghcháin published what might well be the final word on that triumph.

This report wasn’t about who won or lost – just why people did or didn’t vote, and what could be done to make that process easier or more enticing.

We should remember that the turnout was 45.8 per cent – but there was a record number of spoilt ballots (12.9%) largely down to people voting for a candidate who had withdrawn from the race. So if you excluded those spoilt votes, this was the lowest turnout in the history of Presidential elections.

That said, if you go on the overall vote cast, this was higher than the 43.9% in 2918 – but that would have been the only Presidential election with a lower turnout.

So An Coimisiún Toghcháin’s report – carried out with the National Election and Democracy Study Management Board – wanted to find out why this happened.

And the finding on why there were so many invalid votes makes for interesting, if predictable, reading.

The highest percentage (45%) said they didn’t like any of the candidates; 27% indicated the process for selecting candidates was unfair; 17% related to not enough choice; 14% were protesting against government policy, and 7% preferred a candidate not on ballot paper.

Overall, almost everyone who voted found it a positive experience (97%) with easy access to their polling station (96%).

Those who did not vote were offered a list of reasons and could select all that applied.

The top five reasons for not voting were being away from home on the day (24%); didn’t know who to vote for (20%); could not decide how to vote (13%); not registered (12%) and work commitments (9%).

And yet 83% agreed that ‘who people vote for can make a difference to what happens’.

Delving into the smaller print, only 71% believed election officials are fair (when there’s never been any reason to believe they weren’t) and while 89% believed their vote was secret once they put it in the ballot box, that means just over one in ten didn’t.

Another finding of interest was the figure of 74% who believed that everyone should be automatically registered to vote once they turn 18 years old; as against that, 89% felt it was their personal responsibility for ensuring their details are up to date on the electoral register. It’s easy to say that most of these results are entirely predictable but that doesn’t mean this exercise isn’t worthwhile.

Because while democracy and the right to vote are rightly cherished, not everyone exercises that – and conversely, they are often the very people who complain most about being locked out of the system.

It’s a cliché, but every vote counts.

Just ask our President Catherine Connolly who lost out on the final seat in Galway West by just 17 votes and after a four-day recount back in 2011.

Before that, in 1987, the then-Tánaiste and Labour leader Dick Spring held on to his seat in Kerry North by just five votes, after six counts and a full recount, defeating Fianna Fáil’s Tom McEllistrim.

And proving that there’s life after near-death, five years later, he led the party to its most successful election ever and became Tánaiste again.

So a handful of votes can make or break a political career and more fundamentally, exercising your democratic right is a duty as well as a privilege.

Equally, if politicians have the courage to put themselves forward, then the least that we should do in return is take the time to cast a vote and put it in the ballot box.

© Connacht Tribune