Mr. Joe O'Connor:

Most of the research we have examined in this area has not really drilled down into the impact on household distribution of labour. The National Women's Council of Ireland has been involved in our campaign since we launched it on the basis it believes this can be a great enabler of gender equality for the reasons I mentioned earlier. They include enabling men to take on a greater share of the care and responsibilities and, in turn, removing barriers to women in respect of taking on senior leadership positions, training and so on, and providing a greater balance between women and men in that regard.

In the case of many of the surveys we conducted in the initial stages of our membership of this campaign, I was struck by the number of women who responded to say they were currently working a four-day week. They had been reduced to a four-day week because they had come off maternity leave and decided that, because of the benefits to family and work-life balance, they would stay on it. They were getting paid for only four days but their responsibilities and jobs had not changed. They were still expected to do the same work, over four days rather than five. That is a micro example of what we hope will be borne out by the research.

This project will examine time-use diaries of the employees who participate to see what the impact has been on the distribution of labour in the home. Most of the research on carbon emissions and working-time reduction relates to the company-level impacts, such as commuting, energy use and buildings, but there has not been a great deal of analysis of the behavioural changes that happen with individuals. Is it the case that when people work and live more intensely, they are unable to live as sustainably as they would like? That is the kind of question we hope this research project will answer. The broader the programme, the more we will be able to delve into some of those important questions.