Ms Tara Farrell:

I thank the committee for giving us the opportunity to present today. I will start with just a few words about Longford's Women's Link. We are a social enterprise founded in 1995. We provide services to about 900 women and 130 children in Longford annually. Those services include education, childcare, entrepreneurship, community employment and domestic violence support. We do this via our unique model of integrated service delivery. We engage in widespread regional and national advocacy. Our chief executive officer is on the board of the National Women's Council of Ireland, NWCI, while I sit on the board of Irish Rural Link. I am also the current chair of AONTAS, the national adult learning organisation, and I sit on the steering group of The Next Chapter project, an initiative of Irish Rural Link and Politics Plus based in Stormont.

One of our flagship programmes at Longford Women's Link, the Women’s Manifesto Programme, is a unique model of local democratic engagement which aims to support women in Longford and other counties to play an active and meaningful role in their local decision-making structures. Just last month we launched the See Her Elected, SHE, project with 50:50 North West, supported by the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government. The project aims to change the face of local government in rural Ireland and support women to play an active role in public life. The Women’s Manifesto Programme was supported by the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust from 2012 until the cessation of the trust’s operations in the Republic of Ireland in 2016.

Longford Women’s Link and the Women’s Manifesto Programme have been active members of the Towards a New Common Charter initiative since 2015 and see it as a key all-island programme of sustained engagement as we move beyond the Brexit referendum outcome. We believe that working at the grassroots level, as this programme most definitely does, is critical if we are to see meaningful co-operation and community development alongside an empowered civic society across these islands. We are already involved in a cross-Border project with WOMEN'STEC in Belfast, and our first cross-Border conference takes place in Monaghan later this month.

We have seen with Brexit what happens when civil society is largely excluded from central discussions. Whatever happens with Brexit, we believe that the voices of grassroots women, especially in rural areas, not only need to be heard but are essential in building inclusive and resilient communities. There is significant potential within the new common charter to do this. If we want an effective democratic society that embodies the spirit of the Good Friday Agreement with active and engaged citizens and communities, then we need, first, support for the new common charter and, second, support for civil society organisations. That means financial support from all the administrations. We believe, however, that that is an investment in our communities and in the future of these islands.