Madam, - Frank McNally is quite right to protest at the number of redundancies that litter English as it is used in Ireland today (An Irishman's Diary, May 31st).
He points the finger particularly at lawyers, but they are not the only ones at fault. RTÉ, both radio and television, and even your esteemed publication has treated us to these examples of redundancies: a collective group, transformational changes, a 16 year old teenager, dying of a terminal illness (or even in a fatal accident), sharing in common, 6am in the morning, aged eight years old, scheduled appointments, the central median, heading northbound (the latter two are courtesy of AA Roadwatch, which is in danger of creating an entirely new language of its own with tautology, grammatical errors and weird intonation as integral features).
In an era where time is of the essence, surely saying the same thing twice should be considered unacceptable? - Yours, etc,
EILEEN CASEY,
Huntstown Rise,
Dublin 15.