John Crown (Independent)

Working as I do in a world in which female colleagues predominate, in a specialty that will soon be female dominated in Ireland, judging by the welcome increase in the number of female medical students, I would also welcome an increase in the participation of women in the political process. It would make our political system a lot more mature and there would be much higher levels of emotional intelligence if more women were involved.

When one looks for international precedents, one is reminded of the Northern Ireland Women's Coalition which, when the rest of that society was often blindly following testosterone soaked, gun toting goons around the country, was espousing a vision of the future that was more rational and mature. One also thinks of the mothers of the disappeared in Argentina, one of the greater foci of opposition to authoritarian military dictatorship in what was then a very oppressed country. One also thinks of the Peace Movement of Northern Ireland - the peace women - which, at a time when it was very unfashionable to do so, led the cause for a peaceful alternative to the internecine sectarian strife that was destroying the community. Every one of the organisations mentioned would not be funded under the new legislation. They would effectively be legislated out of existence because they are single gender organisations which would not meet the requirement to have a minimum number of men. Therein lies the weakness with this attempt to impose by fiat something which is desirable but which should come about by other means. Effectively, what we are doing is handing power to the Government or a majority in the Dáil to determine the nominations process of minority political parties, which is wrong. This is bad for democracy, smacks of tokenism and will not work. Instead political parties should reform themselves and acknowledge that they would do better if they had a more representative spectrum with more female candidates emerging.

Until recently, the best health spokesperson with whom I had the occasion to interact during the years - as the House is aware, I am very supportive of the Minister - was a female who, sadly, was never appointed Minister, former Deputy Liz McManus, who would have made a fine Minister for Health. Equally, the person I honestly reckon was the least satisfactory as Minister for Health and Children was also a woman, although I will not personalise the issue. Ability cuts across the gender divide. It is, therefore, incumbent on politicial parties to pick the best candidates. This legislation will, however, impose by fiat something which, at its core, is anti-democratic. Therefore, I oppose it.