Tim Lombard (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Troy. Has the consultation process begun for the new national women and girls strategy? Has a committee been put in place and what are the proposed timelines for putting the new strategy in place? As the Minister of State is aware, the national women and girls strategy 2017-2020 was launched by the then Minister, Frances Fitzgerald.It was considered at the time a crucial framework of actions to address issues regarding women in the workplace and women in society. Last year, the chairperson of the Citizens' Assembly, Dr. Catherine Day, was quoted in The Irish Times, in a very pronounced statement, as saying there is a feeling among the citizens involved in the assembly that gender equality was going backwards, not forwards, even though more than 50 years of legislation is in place regarding equal pay. That statement was probably the most frightening of all in that the chairperson of the Citizens' Assembly felt that the citizens involved in that forum felt we were going backwards after 50 years of legislation.

When we take into consideration that a strategy was put in place in 2017, the issues seem to be within society itself in terms of how we deal with this. The overall gender balance issue in the Civil Service has been addressed to some degree but there are still huge issues. Unfortunately, men are twice as likely as women to be involved in senior roles, even where women have the same level of qualifications and length of service. A similar position is found across both the public and private sectors when it comes to employment. Women are losing out on both income and the ability to achieve in their employment, which is a huge issue, and our society is losing in not picking up on that ability of women in society. Women have such potential, and if this is utilised, we will have a greater society.

Much work needs to be done. Among the 139 actions that were put in place in this four-year strategy - more were to be added afterwards which were not then added - there were supposed to be two reviews. I note that the 2018 review is on the website and the Minister of State might confirm whether the 2019 review actually happened and was posted on the website. If it has been, I apologise, but I cannot find it. The final review of the strategy was to be published by the end of 2020 and it is a very important review for this living document. We need to take from that review what we have achieved in the past four years and build on that going forward. That will probably be the biggest body of work we need to look at.

We have been talking about this issue for 50 years and we have made major inroads, but unfortunately there is much to do. This is a living document, as the former Minister and spokesperson, Frances Fitzgerald, said. How can we progress this living document? What are the timescales? What reviews are going to happen? When will a new strategy be put in place?