Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Yes. I thank the Minister for his comprehensive and helpful overview of the work that has been done following on from the publication of our report. I thank Deputy Cronin and the Minister for their kind words. It seems we are all in the revolution together. Whatever about a woman’s place being in the revolution, I am struck by the old slogan, “A woman’s place is in the House – Leinster House”. We are still a long way off achieving equality in Leinster House, with only 23% of our TDs being women. To put it another way, 77% of our TDs are male, so we need to do much more in that regard.

I appreciate that the Minister started by noting that, of the 205 actions in the committee’s action plan, 190 had been implemented or were in progress towards implementation. It struck me that it would be helpful if we – I do not just mean those of us involved in this debate – could be furnished with that progress report and it was publicised. In fact, that is something we on the committee discussed, as the citizens themselves have asked us how we will ensure implementation of the action plan. We discussed trying to reconvene at a point six or 12 months on – I believe we even discussed it with the Minister during some of his very positive engagements with the committee – and formalising a follow-up. It would be good to have a published summary of the recommendations and the progress being made on them. It would be helpful even in the next week in the lead-up to the referendum.

Regarding the “yes, yes, and”, many organisations have expressed concerns about the wording, especially organisations concerned with disability rights. They are concerned about what the “and” is and what the Government will commit to doing regardless of whether the referendum is passed to ensure support for care beyond the constitutional text. It is the idea I mentioned of deeds as well as words. The Minister rightly pointed out that ratification of the optional protocol was important, but so are some of the measures recommended by the citizens’ assembly in the chapters on care and social protection. As the Minister stated, some are in progress and some are being implemented, but there are others that still require implementation. I will speak more in a moment about some of those aspects of care and support. Furnishing or making public an implementation list would be helpful.

Regarding the referendum, the Minister is right that the neglect language in Article 41.2 is deeply troubling and anyone who hears it for the first time is shocked. It is that visceral response we need to think about during the debate over the next week. I will be engaging in a number of debates and putting the yes-yes side. As one colleague told me, it is a matter for us to reflect on how we would feel on International Women’s Day, and two days later on Mothers’ Day, if there were a no vote on the fortieth amendment and people voted to retain the phrase that referred to mothers and the concept of neglect of duty by mothers, which is not only deeply troubling for women and mothers, but also for fathers, given their responsibilities and duties are not mentioned, even though many fathers now take on an important role in parenting. That is an important point to make.

Moving on from the referendum, I acknowledge the progress made on women in politics. The Minister made the point that the gender quota rises to 40%. The quota was put in place by 2012 legislation that largely arose because of our report on women’s participation in politics. In that report, we noted the five Cs that were barriers to women’s participation: a lack of cash; a lack of childcare; a lack of confidence; a culture in politics, which still remains very male dominated; and candidate selection procedures. We sought to tackle those five Cs, at least partially, through the implementation of the gender quotas. That the quota rises to 40% is welcome, as is the progress that has been made on maternity leave. I am glad to hear that measures on maternity leave for Oireachtas Members are coming through, too. Something the committee and the citizens’ assembly sought was an extension of the quota to local elections, given that local elections form the pipeline to the Dáil and Seanad, but we are still seeing no obligation on parties to run particular percentages of women or men. Of course, we are all conscious of the need to do so to meet the general election quota, but it is a glaring issue.

I am glad to hear the review of the equality legislation, which we referred to extensively in our report, is near completion, or so I believe the Minister said, and will be published shortly. That is important.

I will finish briefly on the three areas I mentioned where the assembly and our committee made some important recommendations. Regarding care, the idea of a real welfare state and a strong framework for care, we in the Labour Party believe in a strong welfare state to raise a floor beneath which nobody can fall. We believe in the need to ensure the State takes on this role of support. We can see that coming through strongly in the citizens' assembly’s recommendations, wherein there is a critique of a hands-off approach and a piecemeal, patchwork provision of care in the childcare and elder care sectors and the idea that a radical overhaul is necessary. The citizens’ assembly called for radical change in childcare and a move towards a universal, publicly funded model. In our action plan, we acknowledged the progress that had been made on reducing costs for parents, which the Minister discussed alongside investment, and increasing wages and pay for childcare professionals and early years educators. While those measures are welcome, we are still not seeing a radical shift – what we in the Labour Party describe as a Niamh Bhreathnach moment – towards a guarantee of childcare and preschool places. What I am hearing in my constituency, and this arose at the hearings as well, has to do with the lack of availability of places. This lack is still not sufficiently addressed in the Government’s response to our report.

The citizens' assembly and our report called for HSE-equivalent pay and conditions for home care workers and an examination of the intersection of care and social protection schemes. We supplied a pathway towards a person-centred and rights-based care infrastructure. What we on the committee were looking for was an end to the existing individualised and pay-per-use system that prevailed. I acknowledge that progress has been made, but there is still more to be done to move towards the vision that is so clearly evident in the citizens’ assembly and in the Oireachtas committee’s report.

Regarding workers’ rights, we acknowledged in our report the great progress on gender pay gap reporting. It is long overdue but important to see. We also acknowledged the progress made on domestic violence leave.

That was in train as we reported and, as the Minister said, it has been implemented since.

I am sorry the Government still has not introduced the reproductive health leave that we in the Labour Party had called for and that was called for in the report, as well as leave and pregnancy loss before 24 weeks. I acknowledge there has been some progress with the UCC study but we need to see it implemented. We also need to see real gender proofing. The Minister referred to progress on that in his speech but it came across very strongly in the citizens’ assembly. Gender proofing of budgets and legislation is needed to ensure that every new initiative serves to increase and strengthen gender equality, not to exacerbate inequality. We are hopeful there will be further progress on that particularly when we see the review of the equality legislation completed.

I will conclude on the issue of domestic, sexual and gender based violence. I welcome, as did Deputy Cronin, the establishment of Cuan, the new statutory agency. That was something that really came through strongly at the citizens’ assembly. I want to acknowledge it was not intended that it would address domestic, sexual and gender based violence initially but Dr. Catherine Day told us that the assembly ensured that it would include recommendations on that. They are really helpful recommendations. Key to them was the concept of a new statutory agency and it is really welcome to see that progress.

Last week, I attended a seminar, hosted by Labour Women and the Committee of the Regions. We heard powerful evidence from Women’s Aid and AkiDwA, among others. They expressed concern that even with the establishment of the statutory agency and even with the new third national strategy, which again, we acknowledge is great progress, there still are serious issues around court processes. These are long-standing issues like lack of supports for victims or complainants and a lack of access to authoritative and reliable data. That is a real issue which is linked to difficulties in the legal process. There is a need to ensure there is adequate refuge supports for women experiencing domestic abuse but crucially to also ensure that women do not have to always leave their homes. Something that successive Oireachtas committees and reviews have looked at is how the State can support those suffering domestic abuse and support them to be able to stay in their homes, both women and children, predominantly, rather than always trying to shore up, through refuge space and so on, supports for women who have been forced to leave their homes. These are big issues that our report and the citizens’ assembly could not solve but we did want to ensure that we were putting a marker down for the Government to address that.

There is a great deal more that could be said on our report, on the 45 recommendations of the citizens’ assembly and on our 205 actions. I thank the Minister for his really constructive engagement and, in particular, for outlining the progress that has been made on those recommendations. It is very heartening for us to hear that, as members of the committee. It would be very heartening for the members of the citizens’ assembly who I know are listening in and following this debate with great interest.

It is great we are having the debate a week before the referendums are being held. There was a long delay. That was disappointing for all of us and for the citizens so it is great to see that the referendums will be held and that we are moving forward on all those other recommendations too and I hope we can come back to this House at some point for further follow-up and further debate and discussion about further progress being made so we can see that unfinished democracy finally become finished.

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