Sir, No one seems to have commented that the convoluted and undemocratic process employed in the recent Northern Ireland election was completely unnecessary. The stated purpose of its architects was to ensure representation of the so called fringe loyalist parties at the forthcoming talks. However, this could have been readily achieved by treating Northern Ireland as a single constituency and allocating seats proportionately, with one per cent of the vote as a threshold.
On the basis of the recent poll, this would have resulted in the following apportionment of seats in an 110 member forum: UUP: 27 (actual electoral result after award of extra seats: 30) SDLP: 24 (21) DUP: 21 (24) Sinn Fein: 17 (17) Alliance: 4 (3) UK, Unionists: 4 (2) PUP: 4 (2) UDP: 3 (2) Women's Coalition: 1(2) Labour: (stretching a point) 1(2).
It is clear that the large unionist parties got more seats than they should, while the small parties are under represented. Rather than attending the forum on the basis of the votes cast for their parties, they are in receipt of a kind of grace and favour treatment. This must inevitably devalue the electoral mandates of the PUP and UDP and, dare one say it, that of Dr Cruise O'Brien who under a single constituency list system would have been elected in his own right. Yours, etc., Sandymount, Dublin 4.