Madam, - As another general election approaches, perhaps it is time for us to consider just how democratic our proportional representation system really is.
While it may be true that no other system produces a result that more fairly reflects a party's popularity in terms of seats gained in Dáil Éireann, it is still far from being fully democratic.
At the moment we have two Cabinet ministers from a party that struggles to gain 5 per cent in all polls. This could and should be interpreted as meaning that 95 per cent of the voters don't want them in Government. At the same time, parties that regularly gain 8 per cent, 10 per cent and even 25 per cent in polls are excluded from the Cabinet table.
Would it not be a far better system if it was enshrined in our Constitution that the party or parties with the most seats would be legally bound to form a government?
Thus, if no party achieved an outright majority, a government would have to be created from a coalition of the two largest parties, all the other parties becoming the opposition.
We would then have a stable Government reflecting the democratic will of perhaps 75 to 80 per cent of the electorate and an opposition that would be far more likely to offer a genuinely different political philosophy and approach. - Yours, etc,
PADDY STACK, Creagh Hill, Gorey, Co Wexford.