Sir, Regarding your editorial of February 14th on politicians pay, the spokesman for the group advocating a 30 per cent increase used as one of the bases for the increase that UK MPs were paid £43,000 a year. While TDs were paid only IR£33,854, he omitted to mention that the number of electors for each UK seat was far greater than for each Irish seat.
Our Constitution states that there shall be not more than one TD for each 20,000 and not less than one TD for each 30,000 of the population. In the UK, the average number of electors per seat is 67,000.
In the five seat Wicklow constituency, with an electorate of 80,599, this represents 16,120 electors per seat, while, in the three seat Donegal North East constituency, with an electorate of 49,473, it represents 16,491 electors per seat. If our TDs were as productive as their UK counterparts, they might deserve a salary increase. - Yours, etc.
Clooney,
Ramelton,
Co Donegal.