Sinn Fein is currently in the High Court trying to force the Government to move the writ for the Donegal South-West by-election, which they would be hoping to win with their putative candidate Senator Pearse Doherty.
The vacancy occurs following the election of sitting FF TD Pat “the Cope” Gallagher to the European Parliament in June 2009.
The Government is almost certain to lose the by-election and consequently has been stalling the contest for as long as possible.
While I fully agree that the by-election is way overdue (and is only one of three such outstanding contests), I think it’s rank hypocrisy for Sinn Fein to claim that the absence of one TD in a multi-seat constituency constitutes a democratic deficit, when their own elected MPs in Northern Ireland, each the sole representative in a single-seat constituency, refuse to take their seats at Westminster.
Footnote: A variant published as a letter in the Irish Times
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