Electoral systems and political stability

Sir, – John O’Hagan (Letters, July 1st) criticises the suggestion that the UK’s “first past the post” electoral system brings political stability, on the grounds that they have had “five prime ministers in under a decade”.

We in Ireland have changed our prime minister four times in that decade, the same number of times as they have in the UK. This hardly suggests that our much-vaunted proportional representation single transferable vote system provides any greater degree of political stability than the first past the post system.

In fact, the continuing political fragmentation of recent years, and the recent treatment of the taoiseach’s office as a political bauble which can be swapped around in a political game of “pass the parcel”, virtually guarantees that Ireland will have far more changes of taoiseach than the UK will have changes of prime minister in the years to come. – Yours, etc,

BARRY WALSH,

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Clontarf,

Dublin 3.