Madam, - Early last August I received a summons to appear on a jury in Dublin. Subsequently the summons was withdrawn because I was over 70 years old. As I thought about this it occurred to me that this was discriminatory but that there could be a good legal reason for it.
I wrote, somewhat tongue-in-cheek, to the Department of Justice, Equality , etc. in the expectation that they would, at least, reply to my letter. When they did not, I sent a reminder. As it happens, I admitted to being over 80 years old, so it may be that, in addition to being barred from jury duty, my age also bars me from the courtesy of having my existence acknowledged.
I will not give up, but perhaps some of your readers would care to give me moral support. To prove my right to sit in judgment on my peers, I am prepared to sit for any oral and/or written exam., where I shall throw in several Latin tags and Irish "cora cai nte", and robustly defend benchmarking for civil servants. - Yours, etc.,
TOM GERAGHTY, Cappaghmore, Dublin 22.