Ms Maura McNally:

I wish to comment on diversity. In answer to Deputy Creed's question, as the first woman in 41 years to lead the Bar of Ireland, I am more than conscious of how the bar is perceived. I apologise to Senator McDowell and anybody else here who is from the Bar of Ireland. It is perceived as old, stale, grey, cigar smoking and claret drinking. I have drunk a few glasses of claret in my time. However, we are endeavouring to change not just the perception of the bar but what the bar is.

I have no connection with the law. I come from Leitrim. I have had to fight for everything I have here at the Bar and I encourage everyone, male and female, to do that. Do I believe that Ruth Bader Ginsburg was correct when she was asked how many women she wanted on the Supreme Court? Her answer was that all of them should be women. Do I believe that? Yes, I do. I would say that would be diversity and progress. However, if we can get 50% of our membership to reflect what society looks like, that would be an achievement. The same applies for solicitors. We need to do it across every profession - doctors, nurses, teachers and politicians. It must reflect society. We are aiming for that and we are doing so through educational processes.

We have the Denham fellowship, scholarships for people from DEIS schools. We have our transition year programme, where this year instead of 100 pupils looking at what the bar might offer as a career, when it went online we had over 10,000 pupils, many from my own county and other areas in the west of Ireland. I was delighted with the number of people who viewed what we have to offer. Therefore, we are aiming for diversity and there is a change. This is the first year at the Bar of Ireland that 50% of our intake were women and 50% men. We are getting there, but it takes time. It will not change overnight, but we are getting there. We are progressive in our thinking and we are aiming for diversity across all sections. Race, colour, creed or religion should not matter.

One of the other contributions to diversity is made by solicitors, who represent a very broad geographic spread, which is most important. In respect of the concerns about judicial self-replication, by favouring judges on this board and then allowing them to appoint three ranked candidates, we are almost certainly going to contribute to judicial self-replication.

I believe Senator Martin is next.