Sir, – In an otherwise unexceptionable letter, Fergal Quinn (July 13th) claims that Fine Gael “won a landslide on a promise to clean up Irish politics”. Before Fine Gael’s “landslide” becomes an academic thesis it should be recorded that neither Fine Gael nor its predecessor Cumann na nGael ever won a majority of Dáil seats.
Perhaps the failure of three successive generations of Irish voters to recognise those parties’ preponderous shares of virtue, wisdom and charm needs investigation? Perhaps a German solution, once proposed by Bertolt Brecht could be adapted to meet Irish circumstances: “Dissolve the electorate and constitute a new one.”? – Yours, etc,