John Roger's gang of 50

Posted on January 10, 2011 at 02:36 PM

This is a comment I posted on the Irish Times comment facility about John Rogers proposals as to how our Dail should be elected, as set out in an opinion piece in the paper today, and as also explained by him in a piece on Week in Politics yesterday. 

The article is 'How to break the shackles of a failed political system' by John Rogers SC and is accessible at www.irishtimes.com

8 Ballot papers and all that it would achieve apart from a major deterrent to the voter going into vote with so many ballot papers, would be the same, or at best (worst actually) it would mean a few more celebrities in the Dail. We are a small country and voters will always feel they have a right to contact TDs, no matter how elected, about their concerns, petty and all that John perceives those concerns to be. "Clientelism" or the view voters hold that they have the right to contact their TDs is what is good about our system, and had no role in our economic crisis, which was about the rich and powerful having easy access to Ministers, and an ideology, held by FF and the PDs, based on the interests of the few in our society, rather than the common good. John also betrays the view that the 50 TDs elected on the panels would be superiour, with his requirement that the Taoiseach etc. should be from the gang of 50. However voters are just as likely to view the TDs they elect in their constituency as the ones most qualified to represent them in cabinet - Joanna Tuffy TD 

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