Sir, – The apparent inability of Government to think outside the box never ceases to amaze me. The Bill to reduce the number of TDs (Home News, July 6th) makes no sense. It will permit the number of TDs to be between 152 and 160. Currently, the Constitution requires that each TD represents between 20,000 and 30,000 people. We are to have a referendum on judicial pay this year, surely it is a simple matter to have on the same day a vote to increase the above to between 30,000 and 40,000 of the population. This could cap the number of representatives at 115, more than enough in my opinion given the ease of communication today.
We do not need to retain the ratio of 20,000 to 30,000 established before the advent of television, fax, email and other modern media. – Yours, etc,