Sir, – It doesn’t seem so very long ago that the leaders of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the Labour Party were urging Sinn Féin to sit down with the other parties in Northern Ireland to restore the NI Executive. Now the very same politicians are adamant that Sinn Féin should not sit in government in the Republic. This is not simply rank hypocrisy. It also sends a message that the NI Executive is an inferior body which is not quite on a par with the government which meets in Leinster House. If I were a unionist, I would find this attitude highly insulting. So much for the fine words about a new shared Ireland. – Yours, etc,
EUGENE McELDOWNEY,
Howth, Dublin 13.