Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Deputy was very involved in the Balance for Better Business initiative. Ireland is now among the top ten countries in the EU for female board representation, in figures released by the Balance for Better Business group. This is an independent, industry-led, and Government-supported group with a secretariat provided by my Department. It is encouraging to see steady progress when it comes to the number of women at the board level of Irish business. It is less encouraging to see slower progress when it comes to key board and senior leader positions. The transition of two chairperson roles from women to men at the end of 2022 and the lack of new female chairpersons being appointed has led to a significant drop in the number of women at chairperson level. Now, only one of the 36 listed companies has a female chairperson, while representation of women at CEO level has also dropped from 11.1% in September 2022 to 8.3% in March of this year. There are some very good trends but there are also some backward steps. I had a really good meeting with a women in business group ten days ago and we spent approximately three hours teasing through how we can do better in this space. Clearly there is still work to do. There is in politics too, by the way, it is not just business. We need to increase female representation at all decision making levels, whether it is in policy and politics or whether it is business leaders.