Madam, - Robbie Roulston advocates reform of the Seanad (July 8th).
But perhaps the question we should ask ourselves is: Do we need a senate at all? In the famous remark of the Abbé Sieyès in 1789: "If the second Chamber agrees with the first it is unnecessary; if it disagrees it is pernicious". Surely a second chamber of parliament is a gross extravagance for a small unitary state such as ours.
To the oft-repeated assertion that we need an upper house to supervise or keep an eye on the Dáil, one can ask: how is it that many other small and some medium-sized countries manage perfectly well without a second chamber?
Among those countries that have unicameral legislatures only are New Zealand, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Portugal, Greece, Israel, Peru and the Baltic states of Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia.
In the model of Scandinavian efficiency, Norwegians elect a single 165-member assembly, which on convening divides itself into upper and lower houses - two chambers for the price of one.
It used to be joked that Eamon de Valera set up two institutes in this State, one being the Institute for Advanced Studies, and the other the "Institute for Advanced Buddies", namely the Seanad.
And in case abolition of the Seanad might seem like a far too radical proposal, a precedent for streamlining legislatures by abolishing the second chamber has already been set. New Zealand did it in 1950, Denmark in 1954, and Sweden in 1970. Incidentally, New Zealand's House of Representatives comprises only 120 members for a similar sized population as ours, so we have in total 106 more legislators than they do; but that's an argument for another day. - Yours, etc,
KEN SHEEHAN,
Mourne Road,
Drimnagh,
Dublin 12.