The article "Shallow debate - Members of Parliament (MP) ill-prepared for capital punishment vote" (Gleaner, November 24), ends with an entreaty to the Senate, which I share: "Make the debate (on capital punishment) more educational than emotional."

The entreaty is based on a persuasive critique of a House debate uninformed by any detailed empirical evidence. "Not one MP," you say, "brought statistics to the House as to the number of multiple killings." The article alleges: "Most of their (MPs) arguments hang helplessly; no research, no depth."

Not having followed closely the presentations on either side, I am unable to agree or to disagree with the substance of the writer's critique of this particular debate.

fundamental weakness

Where I am in absolute agreement with the commentary, based on considerable academic study of our system and 10 years as a senator, is your identification of a fundamental weakness in our Parliament: "the problem of lack of research."

It is this fundamental weakness which led two years ago to the establishment of the UWI/Parlia-mentary Internship Research Programme. The research internship programme arose from the of the Oliver Clarke Committee on Parliamentary Salaries (2003), followed up by the parliamentary leaders and by a decision at the University of the West Indies, Mona, to respond to the parliamentary need for research.

parliamentary committees

This programme, therefore, allows members of parliament and parliamentary committees, through the clerk of the Houses of Parliament, to request the UWI's Centre for Leadership and Gover-nance to commission select graduate student interns to conduct, for a modest stipend, under my supervision, a designated body of research.

So far this year a number of parliamentarians have requested and received research briefs.

Among these I recall Senators Oswald Harding and Basil Waite; MPs Gregory Mair, Drs Fenton Ferguson, Wykeham McNeill and Peter Phillips. Subjects recently researched include comparisons between the Jamaican Govern-ment's proposed anti-crime bills and equivalent legislation in the United Kingdom, United States, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and selected Caribbean States.

A dozen graduate students are currently working in the internship programme with funding provided by the Parliament, the university and, in the first year and hopefully henceforth, the private sector.

Regrettably, none of the MPs made use of this readily available facility to strengthen the research base of their arguments on capital punishment.

I am, etc.,

Professor Trevor Munroe

Centre for Leadership and

Governance

UWI