The State’s healthcare watchdog has criticised two care homes for failing to provide elderly residents with adequate voting arrangements during May’s abortion referendum. All care home facilities are required to ensure that every resident is able to use their right to vote in all elections and referendums but the Health Information and Quality Authority (Hiqa) found that the Croft nursing home in Inchicore, Dublin, and Cramers Court nursing home in Belgooly, Co Cork, had failed to do so. By this omission, the care homes effectively disenfranchised the votes of their residents. The two homes in question were found to be in breach of the law when they were subjected to unannounced inspections. It is not known how many other care homes may have similarly failed to provide voting arrangements for their elderly residents.

The incidents contrast with the Government’s major efforts to ensure that students would be given every opportunity and help to vote as they were expected to support the referendum.

Mervyn Taylor, executive director of Sage Advocacy, said: “People can forget that care isn’t just about the physical care but also about people’s rights as citizens.”