Madam, - The NRA's full-page advertisement on the controversial M3 motorway in your edition of December 13th may well have set out unadulterated common sense on the issue. However, in a matter of such intense controversy it is actually shocking that a public body should propagandise in such a profligate manner.
The issue being debated by citizens has acquired a quasi-political character, yet groups and individuals opposed to this State agency's grand plan cannot have access to balancing public funds to counter such extravagant case-making. In other areas where the public mind is not yet settled on issues of major controversy, the expenditure of public and private funds is regulated in various democratically validated ways, including the Ethics in Public Office legislation and the establishment of referendum commissions. The NRA should either voluntarily observe - or else be obliged to observe - similar standards in its use of public funds when it seeks to persuade citizens in this democracy; otherwise we will again feel the chill of big government in our public debates. - Yours, etc.,
HUGO BRADY BROWN, Stratford on Slaney, Co Wicklow.