Sir, – I concur with Richard McDonnell (December 14th) that “we complain often about the calibre and motives of our politicians but it’s only when you see what they could be like that you begin to think how lucky we are to have them”.
Indeed, our much-maligned Dáil representatives are too often undervalued. There are many decent and well-intentioned politicians across the political spectrum in the Oireachtas. The willingness of Micheál Martin and the Fianna Fáil party to extend the confidence and supply arrangement until 2020 could certainly be construed as altruistic and patriotic at this critical juncture in our political history and hopefully this is the primary motivating factor in this welcome decision. However, politicians are nothing if not pragmatic also and perhaps this too may have been a determining factor in the Fianna Fáil decision. – Yours, etc,
PJ McDERMOTT,
Westport, Co Mayo.