Madam, – If I may respond to the call of Peter Mooney, Robin Hanan, and Seamus Boland for views on Seanad Éireann reform (March 29th). I have two votes in the forthcoming election for the Seanad. This is because I am a registered graduate of both Dublin University (Trinity College Dublin) and the National University of Ireland (University College Dublin) and so I can vote for candidates on the panels for those bodies. However, I will not be using any vote for any candidate running for the panels. I have returned the voting papers to the issuing bodies concerned, asking that I also be removed from their register of voters from now on.
Why? Simply because having reviewed yet another paper mountain of election literature from 40 or 50 candidates (I have lost count), I can see no genuine commitment to eliminating the current rotten borough arrangement in favour of something that is fair and representative of all graduates (or indeed other stakeholders) in third-level education in Ireland. Why should I have two votes when another third-level graduate has none at all? Candidates, please spare me all the “right on” or right wing electioneering rhetoric. What is going on here is unfair.
The final straw for me was the refusal of Trinity College Dublin’s Seanad Electoral Office to provide me with a list of the Trinity candidates’ nominees and assessors so that I could make a fully informed decision about whom I might vote for. I did not consider this an unreasonable request. Yet, despite two attempts, I was brusquely told that there was no statutory requirement to provide me with this information but I could go and try and find it on the Internet myself if I was so interested.
Obviously, there is some way to go in establishing a spirit of, if not indeed codified, open processes and transparency of information for university panel voters, even if I could stomach this cosy little arrangement any further.
Clearly, if there is nobody on the electoral register providing a legitimate constituency for these TCD and NUI panel candidates to chase votes from, then change will have to be made. .
I would urge other graduates of TCD and NUI who oppose social exclusion and who favour credible, transparent, fully representative elections to consider sending a message similar to mine and to deregister from the electoral lists.
Can anyone with any sense of fairness stand over the current situation? I doubt it, but I know the people who will. What we have now is little better than the buffoonery of elections held by smug members of undergraduate college debating societies. That some of the characters ultimately remain the same is hardly a coincidence. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – I rarely agree with John Waters, but his piece regarding the Seanad (Opinion, April 8th) does merit serious consideration. I would like to add to his argument that, from a logical perspective, reform of the Seanad is preferable to instant abolition.
If we reform it, we will always have the option of removing it entirely in the future. However, if it is abolished now, we will never know the democratic worth, if any, of a functioning and meaningful upper house. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – There are a very few truly independent candidates in the Seanad elections. By this I mean candidates who have never been a member of any political party. It is interesting, that the letters on reforming the Seanad (April 8th) all come from Fine Gael members. They all make valid and pertinent points but ultimately aren’t they only wolves in sheep’s clothing posing as independent candidates?
As for new thinking, 21 of the candidates on the NUI panel have spent close to €1,000,000 of taxpayers’ money in postal costs for their own self-promotion. The Irish political system must be the only job application process where the employer (the taxpayer) has to pay for the prospective employee’s application.
I choose not do so: I started as I mean to go on, Independent and aware that new thinking begins when one starts the election process, not when one is elected. Here Mr Sullivan and I are in agreement that it “shouldn’t mean that you simply throw money at them and hope for the best”.
As for Seanad Reform, I believe we are in a Republic, would one man one vote be too much to ask the political elite? – Yours, etc,