Sir, – Michael Gallagher proposes the abolition of three-seat constituencies because they are “too small to ensure proportionality” and therefore discriminate against smaller parties and independents (“What is the optimal number of TDs for Ireland? There’s a formula for that”, Opinion & Analysis, September 6th).
At the 2020 election, small parties and independents (that is to say, everyone apart from Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and Sinn Féin) received 32 per cent of the vote and won 51 of the 160 seats – 32 per cent of the total. In the nine three-seat constituencies, small parties and independents won nine of the 27 available seats – 33 per cent of the total.
If small parties and independents which together received 32 per cent of the votes ended up winning 32 per cent of the seats nationally, and 33 per cent of the seats in three-seaters, then how on earth can the electoral system be said to discriminate against them? In fact, our system seems to bring about almost perfect proportionality.
Small parties and independents won at least one seat in seven of the nine three-seat constituencies. In two of them (Cork South West and Roscommon) small parties and independents won two of the available three seats. In two of these constituencies (Galway East and Roscommon) an independent topped the poll.
READ MORE
Where is the evidence for this widely held view that three-seat constituencies discriminate against small parties and independents?
If we were to abolish three-seaters (or, for that matter, to adopt Michael Gallagher’s proposal for seven-seat constituencies) our political system would only fracture even further. Instead, we need to begin to encourage some consolidation of our political system by adjusting our laws on State funding and political fundraising to encourage like-minded independent candidates to organise themselves into political parties, or to join existing ones, and to encourage the endless proliferation of far-left micro-parties to consolidate and start to take on some political responsibility.
Without doing so, we could quickly find ourselves following the path of Belgium, the Netherlands, and Israel, where parliaments have become so splintered that building coalition governments has become almost impossible. – Yours, etc,
BARRY WALSH,
Clontarf,
Dublin 3.
