Ireland voted to retain its upper house of Parliament yesterday, rejecting Prime Minister Enda Kenny’s call to scrap a chamber where the likes of William Butler Yeats once sat but the government saw as redundant.

In a campaign that was backed by some of the opposition and not seen as a chance to punish the government for austerity measures imposed as part of an EU/IMF bailout, 51.7 per cent of the electorate voted against the proposal.

Kenny had argued that the 75-year-old institution was elitist, undemocractic and promised its abolition would save money. Advocates for the Senate, including the main Opposition party Fianna Fail, accused the Government of a power grab.

The 60 members of the Senate, many of whom have jobs outside of politics, have only limited powers such as the ability to temporarily delay legislation.

The Irish Senate, together with an elected Lower House of Parliament, was first established in 1922 when the Irish Free State was set up in 1922 as a Dominion of the British Empire.

This was a year after Malta’s Senate, together with an elected National Assembly, was established with the granting of self-government under British rule in 1921.

The Senate in Malta, however, was abolished in 1949.