Sir, – I agree with Pat Mullen’s suggestion (Letters, November 9th) that resident citizens of Ireland should be able to vote in Seanad elections instead of Richard Logue’s suggestion (Letters, November 5th) that the franchise be given to the Irish abroad.
Currently the Seanad electorate is an elite of politicians who have five separate votes, and graduates of University of Dublin and National University of Ireland. Some politicians can have up to seven votes if they are graduates of one or both of these universities.
As the votes for the university seats are by postal ballot, emigrant graduates can vote from abroad, while the vast majority of the Irish electorate is denied any democratic representation.
In 1979 the Seventh Amendment to the Constitution allowed the government to, at least, expand the university electorate to all third-level institutions. Despite being passed by 92 per cent, no Irish government has been bothered to expand the franchise.
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In 2013, the then Fine Gael-Labour government proposed the best reform of the Seanad ever, to simply abolish it. Opponents of abolition promised the public reform if the referendum was rejected. Sadly the gullible Irish electorate were swindled. They voted to retain the Seanad, and got no franchise reform in return. Yours, etc,
JASON FITZHARRIS,
Swords,
Co Dublin.
