Sir, - A referendum is coming up shortly on the Nice Treaty whereby the people of Ireland will be asked to approve of an enlarged European Union. With that in mind, the Government might just consider an additional referendum on the day to address an outdated flaw in the Constitution which it seems, successive Governments have completely overlooked since Mary Robinson in 1990 and Mary McAleese (1997) became presidents of Ireland.
Article 13.2.2 states: "The President may in his absolute discretion refuse to dissolve Dail Eireann on the advice of a Taoiseach who has ceased to retain the support of a majority in Dail Eireann." Quite clearly when this pillar of law was written in 1937, nobody at the time foresaw that a future president would be female.
As the word "his" is included in this section of constitutional law, it means therefore and in legal technical parlance, that if a Taoiseach was to ask President McAleese not to dissolve the Dail, she would have no such power or authority in law!
Isn't it time to enshrine sexual equality within the Constitution and to prevent a legal crisis should a Taoiseach have second thoughts about dissolving the Dail at some stage in the future? - Yours, etc.,
Ken Murray, Whitecross, Duleek, Co Meath.