Sir, - Maire Geoghegan-Quinn (Opinion, May 8th) accuses the PDs of doing long-term damage to democracy. According to Mrs Geoghegan-Quinn, this threat arose when the Tanaiste, Mary Harney, dared to have "told" the Taoiseach to put his representations on behalf of Philip Sheedy into the public domain or, more particularly, to let Dail Eireann know about it. It was enlightening to be reminded by Fintan O`Toole in the same edition that this same lady, in her previous life as a Fianna Fail Minister of Justice, was seriously admonished by the High Court in 1995 when a former district justice challenged the way she was reducing or remitting fines that had been imposed by the courts. The High Court declared that she had "misapplied her powers". She had "appeared to have exercised a kind of parallel system of justice and to have purported to have administered justice". At least Mary Harney`s alleged threat to democracy was transparent. That we can deal with. - Yours, etc., John T. Kavanagh,
Braemor Road, Dublin 14.