Dr. Fiona Buckley:

I have a few points to make. On the point about sustaining women in politics, the recent announcement on maternity leave for local councillors is a very positive step in that direction. From the research, I see that when women do leave, often it is after a period of trying to balance the work of being a councillor, possibly full-time employment outside of that, and childcare. A lot of that comes to a head when a councillor has a child for the first time. The maternity leave provisions are quite positive in providing supports for women to take maternity leave. The proposal outlined in the heads of the Bill is a facility to co-opt a substitute. That is a positive first step in sustaining women in politics. It goes without saying that something of that nature needs to be also extended to the national level.

In terms of encouraging greater numbers of women to come forward to the Seanad, and in the selection of women, there might need to be a body of work done on the nominating panels, both the inside and outside panels. Perhaps as part of the process, there could be a rule or regulation on having 40% women on the list of candidates put forward by nominating bodies for election to the Seanad. That might go some way towards addressing the under-representation of women in the Seanad.

Reference was made to Malta, which introduced an electoral law and amended its constitution in 2021, whereby if in the course of a general election fewer than 40% women are elected there is now a capacity to add up to 12 extra seats to the parliament to bring up the proportion of women. I looked at some of the figures yesterday. Malta has jumped from being somewhere around 12% or 13% to 27% as a result of the mechanism introduced last year, which was rolled out for the first time in the recent election in March and April. I do not know how that would work in an Irish context or whether it would be constitutionally possible.

The other issue I would keep an eye on, one which Ms Farrell and I spoke about, is the need to select women to winnable seats. Following the recent census in April, there will obviously be a review of the constituency boundaries, and I understand there is talk of an extra 11 Teachta Dalaí being added. There have been suggestions that we might see an increase in the number of three-seat constituencies. Again, the research shows that a higher district magnitude within a constituency is more favourable to the election of under-represented groups in society. I would be keeping an eye on that, although I would be somewhat cautious because if we see an increase in the number of three-seat constituencies, parties will probably select one candidate at most in some of those constituencies. This will mean they will more than likely go with the tried and tested incumbent. As we see from the figures, just 23% of seats in the Dáil are held by women and 77% of the incumbents are men. Will that be an issue going forward for the selection of women to winnable seats? As I said, that is something to keep an eye out for when the review of the constituency boundaries comes up.