Cooper’s Seanad comments half-right

Matt Cooper’s claim (Opinion, Jun 7) that “We have plenty of talking shops, but the lawmaking impact of the Seanad has been minimal” is only half right.

Take the 104 pages of amendments that the Seanad tabled to the recently enacted Personal Insolvency Bill, for example. That’s 104 pages of potential issues with the Bill to which Dáil Éireann had failed to give due consideration. Ultimately, the Bill was enacted with what have been described as “key Seanad amendments” in respect of pensions, reasonable living expenses, and excluded debts.

By Matt Cooper’s standard, the Cabinet is the only body with any lawmaking impact worth speaking of. Or perhaps only the four-man “Economic Management Council”. Maybe the latter could do with a better calibre of candidate too, but that is a different issue to address. Perhaps, then, we should just get rid of Seanad Éireann, Dáil Éireann and 11 members of Cabinet first, to concentrate on that.