Madam, – With all the talk of a general election/national government, may I suggest introducing a negative vote into our electoral system.
Rather than not voting for a candidate, the electorate would have the option of voting against a candidate’s election or re-election. If a candidate gets more No than Yes first preference votes they would not be elected, like in referendums.
At present a candidate can be elected with less than 10 per cent of first preference votes with no idea of what the other 90 per cent of voters think of them. I would suggest that this would reinvigorate our electorate and lead to a truly responsible elected Dáil and a Government we currently badly need and deserve. – Yours, etc,