Sorca Clarke (Longford-Westmeath, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Yes, but please also include the meeting from yesterday. My final question is on the interaction between sustainable development goal, SDG, No. 5 from the UN and the EU Foreign Affairs Council, specifically around gender development. I want to hear about the role this may play in terms of Foreign Affairs Council meetings. The most recent statistics show there are 104.6 women for every 100 men in the EU, so women make up more than 50% of the population. I am not sure how anyone can get 0.6 of a woman, but that is the statistic.

We have focused heavily on this matter over recent years and specifically following Covid. We have seen not only the impact Covid has had on gender equality in this country but its wider impact and the undoing of all of the gains that had been made in some areas. We cannot and should not, and I do not believe the Tánaiste would want to, stand over a situation where hard-won equality gains are allowed to slide backwards. Those gains were very difficult to achieve the first time. That difficulty will be multiplied if we have to do that work all over again to get back to a starting point which existed before Covid.

The gender pay gap is still very real in many areas. We see restricted access to employment and promotional opportunities in employment and education. Representation for women is becoming increasingly difficult in many areas.

Gender equality is important but it has not been mentioned in any of the briefings. Women make up more than half of the population in the EU. I ask the Tánaiste, in this role he has, what level of priority the EU Foreign Affairs Council places on gender inequality.