 The President may also, on request of a majority of Seanad Éireann (the upper house of parliament) and a third of Dáil Éireann (the lower house of parliament), after consulting the Council of State, decline to sign a bill "of such national importance that the will of the people thereon ought to be ascertained" in an ordinary referendum or a new Dáil reassembling after a general election held within eighteen months.This latter power has never been used because the government of the day almost always commands a majority of the Seanad, preventing the third of the Dáil that usually makes up the opposition from combining with it.The President of Italy may request a second deliberation of a bill passed by Parliament before it is promulgated.