‘Moving’ parliaments a boost for democracy

YOUR columnist Noel Whelan’s exhaustive and indeed entertaining review of the campaign to allow elected parliamentarians in the North to sit in the Dáil (Irish Examiner, October 7) overlooks the constitutional origins of the idea.

The 1920 Better Government of Ireland Act, set up both Irish parliaments and I emphasise both Irish. While forbidding members to be elected to both, it nevertheless enjoined all ministers of either parliament to sit and debate in the other at will but not to vote. That means Dáil ministers also speaking in Stormont.

It would be much more productive to adopt this open, co-operative approach instead of the expensive 'cross-border authorities with executive powers,' which are lacking in transparency beyond what civil servants may tell us.