Sir, – Does any political party that is urging voters to reduce the age at which a citizen may run for the office of president actually intend to nominate a candidate aged under 35 at the next presidential election?
All Irish presidents so far have been older than 45, never mind 35. At the last election Labour nominated someone in his seventies, whose age and experience rightly helped him to win and who was popular among younger voters.
If the Government cares deeply about younger people becoming involved in politics then why is the average age of Cabinet Ministers at present 57?
There are 166 TDs in Dáil Éireann. Of these only seven are under 35, and just one of these is under 30 (aged 28).
No TD is aged between 18 and 24, which an Irish Times opinion poll in March suggested is the only age cohort that may actually support the proposal to allow political parties nominate someone aged between 21 and 35. Half of that cohort itself (18-21) will remain ineligible to run no matter what the result is.
An answer to the question above would help one to gauge how serious this proposal is. Cabinet Ministers have not campaigned for it. They appear to have miscalculated that both referendums could be carried largely on the back of campaigns by third parties.
Time to get real for younger citizens? One may do so by voting No to the cynical referendum on age. Shame on youth organisations that have supported or stayed silent about such tokenism. – Yours, etc,
Prof COLUM KENNY,
Dublin City University,
Dublin 9.