THE CHAIRPERSON OF the Women’s Council of Ireland (NWCI), Ellen O’Malley-Dunlop, has been named as a Fine Gael candidate in the hotly contested Dublin South West constituency.

The women’s rights campaigner will join sitting TD Colm Brophy on the Fine Gael ticket. The party came close to securing two seats in the constituency in the 2016 election when candidate Anne Marie Dermody narrowly lost out to Katherine Zappone.

Dermody secured 2,000 more first preference votes than Zappone but was eventually pipped by the now Minister for Children and Youth Affairs on the 16th count.

John Lahart of Fianna Fáil, AAA-PBP’s Paul Murphy and Sinn Féin’s Seán Crowe currently hold the three other seats in the historically volatile constituency. Dermody retired from politics last year.

Katherine Zappone TD and Ellen O'Malley Dunlop at an event in 2016. Source: Mark Stedman/Photocall Ireland

O’Malley-Dunlop, who was CEO of the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre for 10 years, was added to the ticket at a meeting of Fine Gael’s Executive Council last night.

The trained psychotherapist unsuccessfully ran for the Seanad in 2016. She is a member of the Board of Gaisce, the Legal Aid Board and is an Adjunct Professor to the School of Law UL.

“I am delighted to be announced as a Fine Gael General Election candidate for Dublin South West and I look forward to the challenge,” she said.

For more than ten years as CEO of the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre, I have influenced positive change on complex issues such as sexual and gender based violence and the rights of victims of crime. If elected I will continue to work for legislative reform for women’s and victims’ rights.

O’Malley-Dunlop on the will stay in her current role as Chairperson of the NWCI until a general election has been called and will then step down.