Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour)
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127. To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade the gender breakdown of his Department in respect of principal officers, assistant secretaries and secretaries general, respectively; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [5853/25]

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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The Department of Foreign Affairs is fully committed to promoting and maintaining an inclusive and diverse workplace for all employees and is taking a proactive and strategic approach to advancing gender equality and wider diversity and inclusion issues as articulated in its Gender, Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion (GEDI) Action Plan which was launched in July 2022.

In that Plan, the Department committed to achieving gender balance at principal officer and equivalent grades by the end of 2025, and to having at least 45% women in assistant secretary and higher grades within the same time frame.

In July 2022 the Deparment's gender balance at principal officer and equivalent level was 55.5% male and 44.5% female and at assistant secretary and above it was 67.9% male and 32.1% female.

The table below shows the gender breakdown of those grades as of 12 February 2025 confirming we have acheived our targets at both principal officer level and at assistant secretary and above.