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LEGISLATION requiring Ireland’s political parties to offer a minimum proportion of candidates from both sexes has been sent to the President for signature into law, after clearing all stages in the Oireachtas today.
The Electoral (Amendment) (Political Funding) Bill 2011 would see parties lose half of their central exchequer funding unless the minority sex among their candidates accounts for 30 per cent of the entire national ticket at the next general election.
The threshold will then rise to 40 per cent once the new 30-per-cent minimum has been in place for seven years – possibly as soon as 2019, or as late as 2022.
The legislation gained its final formal approval in the Dáil yesterday, after the government made 33 final amendments to the legislation, in order to incorporate some of the recommendations of the Mahon Tribunal.
The final legislation was agreed unanimously by the Dáil, with the final amendments rubberstamped by the Seanad this morning when the legislation was also unopposed.
As the Bill was securing its final approval, environment minister Phil Hogan said he had noted a “change from reporting what actually happens to actually giving your personal view as a journalist” since he had first entered the Oireachtas in 1987.
“The politics of perception rather than the politics of truth is what we’re engaged in,” Hogan said, saying he personally found this “rather depressing”, and “corrosive to democracy”.
The law, assuming it is signed by the President next week, will now also require parties to include details of their local branches in the register of political parties, and also requires the setting up of a new register of corporate donors.
It also reduces the limits of how much a politician can accept from any personal or corporate donor in any calendar year.
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How about the best person for the job regardless of sex, race, age and all the other do gooder causes
Brilliant
“Ah sure, she only got elected coz she’s a woman.” <– the last thing we need.
How will that happen? It’s candidate quotas, not election quotas.
There’s going to be a serious amount of TD’s getting a sex change over the summer recess
Mollydot, you’re right, but in fairness we both know this is exactly what people will be saying, regardless.
All other things being equal, let’s say we have two potential candidates that we hope to be put up for elections. One is a man, the other is a woman, and putting the woman up for election means the party will reach their gender quota.
One of the potential candidates happens to have a lot of experience, is excellent at their job, and is very popular among the people in the constituency. The other has much less experience, isn’t well known, and has a record of not delivering.
Now let’s say that the “better” candidate is not allowed to run for election, simply because he is a man. Is this fair? Is this democracy?
The law was passed to reduce inequality between genders in politics, but I honestly fear that it will only serve to undermine democracy and to instead increase these inequalities. I do think there will be people who will say “she was elected just because she was a woman”, regardless of that politician’s abilities or whether or not she is the best person for the job. Is this fair on that politician?
I get why this law was passed, and I 100% agree that there should be more women in politics. But this is going the wrong way about it. Instead of punishing parties for not putting forward female candidates, and instead of potentially undermining democracy, we should be looking at why women are not running for election in the first place.
This law is simply putting a plaster on a symptom while ignoring the underlying illness.
It’s a quota across the country. Do you really think all the male politicians are so good that Mr Fantastic will be set aside for Ms Crappy?
And even if it did come down to that, why not run both of them? Mr Fantastic will be voted in. Ms Crappy may or may not, depending on who else is running in her constituency.
Conor, the fact of the matter is that there are far far too few women in Irish politics. If you think it is because they are less capable in general than their male counterparts I think you really do need to look at your own prejudices.
If the current gender imbalance were an accurate reflection of the abilities of Irish women to hold posts of political power then Ireland must have extremely incapable women. So let’s say that Irish women are capable… then were does this huge imbalance come from? I would suggest that it is an inherent bias in the system.
Now we could sit around and wait for this imbalance to sort itself out as time went by, or we could take action to force that change to happen more quickly. A more gender balanced government is not only a better reflection of Irish society as a whole, but it will stop the kinds of maladjusted behavior that almost exclusively male/female groups get up to. It’s a big change for the better so we may as well hurry it along.
Dennis, you may have picked up what I was saying the wrong way, but I am definitely not prejudiced against women, and I never, ever said they were less capable than men.
There are a couple of reasons why women may not be entering politics. One that comes to mind is that women are still seen as the one to raise a family. So if a couple has kids then in most cases it’s the woman that stays at home to look after the children, while the man continues working. The fact that there’s no paternity leave in Ireland pretty much forces this situation, where there aren’t really any other options: why would a couple just have one income (from the woman’s work, if the man stays at home) when they could have both an income and maternity leave?
This is just one example (and maybe not the best), but enforcing gender quotas when underlying issues such as the one above go unresolved cannot be good for politics in Ireland.
ah. The lunatics really ARE running the asylum. This is a ridiculous law, people should hold office based on ability and merit, not fecking gender.
So, equality of result is officially more important than equality of opportunity
Great, positive discrimination. That never results in bitterness and resentment. It changes attuitudes too.
Actually 2.7% of the population is from the UK and able to vote in Dail elections. How about 2.7% of TDs be required to be from the UK?
Brace yourself for a Gerry Adams joke
Why not have quotas for gays quotas for protestants, quotas for travellers, etc
So what happens next , we bring in quotas in employment law for the boardroom or shop floor. Two people go for a job, both equally qualified and they sorry to the guy because we already have to many guys .
Quotas are bullshit pushed by feminists of the world. Best person qualified for the job gets it , be they man or woman. There is also a suggestion the hours of sitting of the dail be changed to suit working mothers who look after the kids during school time with school runs . This system is getting bizarre .
A recent survey revealed that women were discriminated against for promotion in the work place. They never asked why! Many women choose to take up the working and maternal role and choose part-time positions.
It’s unfair that women are the ones that have the babies but thats nature and their is nothing we can do about that although I’m sure Phil hogan has thought about it .
It’s a fact that research in the Uk said that when employers went to recruitment companies to hire they requested that they did not want women of child bearing age. Some say this is discrimination and i am sure it is but for a small business it makes perfect sense. Why would you go to the trouble of training somebody for a project when there is a possibility they will leave on maternity leave , leaving you in a position to have fill the position again and retrain another person .I agree it’s unfair , unjust , discrimination but it’s a fact .
I agree with equality and I think right minded employers are very fair when it comes to employment but there will always be in quality in employment to some extent .
There will always be some level of inequality because we are men and women and we are different by the very of the fact that we are opposite genders .
For example men and women inherently choose certain careers and might I say not all women and all men. Many are happy and suited in any any career. Most of the construction industry are men. Most beauticians women because they enjoy the job. Women and men are different in so many ways and we both have our advantages . There are so many things that a woman can do better than me and in many cases vice versa .
The problem is extreme feminists who for some reason want equality to the letter of the law and that’s a physical impossibility. Woman cant be men and men can’t be women , so stop trying to make them men and vice versa .
The equality authority needs to take action of a woman is blatantly discriminated against but to bring in quota laws in itself is discrimination .
As somebody already said next we will have black /White , traveller /non traveller , religious persuasion and the list goes on with quotas.
Sorry for typos , iphone is a pain :-)
Jesus Niall get off the fence haha
I find it ironic that the very fact that this bill was written and passed without any external pressure is concrete proof that it is entirely unnecessary. Anybody who claims politics is a boys club has no argument when the politicians made this up without any of us asking them to.
I think the real reason this bill was passed was to push out smaller parties, fringe parties like the independent parties within the ULA can’t cope with a gender quota if they only field 3-5 candidates. Even Sinn Fein only has a 25% female membership; in order to provide a 40% female representation after 2019 they have to choose candidates in such a way that an arbitrary male member is only 75% as likely to get on the ballot paper compared to their female counterparts. This isn’t about equality, this is about rigging the system.
Couldn’t have put it better myself.
ULA recieves no central funding anyway though, but not sure how this forthcoming legislation would affect SF. But that’s an interesting spin on it, you might be onto something there.
Good point Martin. But ULA (and any other forthcoming parties) may well get funding in 2016, all it takes is 2% of the preference votes and straight away they get €125,000. Or botch an election campaign trying, I’d say the coalition parties would settle for either.
At the risk of asking the forbidden question on the journal, where are all these red thumbs coming from? 31 comments and not one welcoming this idea, yet most comments are unpopular? Does anyone have an argument why this is a good idea?
I imagine Sinn Féin understand this concept well…sometimes measures are needed to prevent the tyranny of the majority…powersharing in Northern Ireland is based on a concurrent majority concept…(and imo rightly so)…protecting minorities from oppression by the majority…legislation was enacted In NI to ensure the minority had a voice, which otherwise would have been impossible to achieve. this gender measure in politics here in the south…operates in a similiar vein…it may not be a perfect solution, however…the continuing imbalance has not been countered via other measures so perhaps it is time to give it a helping hand…that said… nobody is forcing anyone to vote for any particular person…male or female…only that at grassroots level… parties must seriously address the issue…where the majority population is a tiny minority in the political arena.
Fiona you’re making a fatal assumption in your terminology. You talk about a solution, inherently assuming that this is a problem. And the NI situation is different, Catholics/Republicans had wildly different political views to Protestants/Unionists, women and men don’t have contrasting political views. In NI they endeavoured to ensure that all political views are represented, this is massively different to here, gender has no relevance to political view.
We do try to get different views represented here. That’s why we have PR.
Brendan…the assumption you make that this is a non-issue / problem is wide of the mark…this is a topical issue for some time…for e.g….go through the journal archives and see this particular issue has been a news item numerous times…and also in the general media. Insisting this is not a problem / issue…serves to prove your assumption is flawed in suggesting that gender has no relevance to political view.
Many studies highlight…generally men and women emphasise different issues…for e.g. pay equity – the glass ceiling – the glass cliff – childcare – workplace benefits and supports – maternity / paternity leave -healthcare etc…on average women have more in common with other women and vice versa.
Representation in the political arena is predominantely male…while many groups are under represented…the most obvious example is women…women are able to represent themselves and shouldn’t have to rely on a man to do this…women have their own views and voice…traditionally politics is male dominated and as such candidate selection is mainly decided by the boys network.
People won’t vote on gender alone, however, broadening the pool of candidates is a step in the right direction toward a balance of input of both sexes…however irrelevant that may seem to some men or women!
Finally, the comparison made to NI explains the flaw in the assumption you suggested …that this kind of legislation – is a disavantage to fringe parties / anti- democratic / positive discrimination etc. – rather it’s a plus for representation of the diversity.
Is this not undemocratic? It will be inevitable that the majority of people in some areas won’t be able to vote for who want simply because a quota has to be reached.
I’m not sure what you’re trying to say here. Currently, not everybody gets to vote for who they want, quotas or not, because who they want to vote for isn’t running in their constituency.
Or maybe you mean that in some constituencies, someone wouldn’t be able to vote for a man in party A, because Party A only put forward a woman. Well, if you were in Clare or Cork SW in 2011, you couldn’t have voted for a woman in party A, B, C or D, because not one party put forward a female candidate. Same for Cork SW or Limerick West in 2007.
Or perhaps you think the quota is for the results of the election, rather than the candidates. If that’s the case, you’re just wrong.
What a result for democracy is! In the never ending search for “equality” women only groups and weak willed politicians have just reversed decades of progress of democracy. I or any man who wants to put themselves forward for election can now be cast aside by a less qualified, less experienced woman, just to fill some inherently sexist and backwards quota! This crap actually turns my stomach! The irony of feminists and their supporters actually creating inequality with a view to creating equality is clearly lost on all the buffoons in Dail Eireann. Oh wait, sexism only exists if you’re a woman?
“minority gender” not “woman” – they’re not so dim as to have anticipated the “it’s only sexism of you’re a woman” argument. Sorry. Gender quotas for TDs is still an idiotic idea, IMO.
Aren’t you part of a feminist group? I would actually be very interested in their opinion on this.
But women aren’t a minority gender? Males are in the minority socially last time I checked weren’t they? It was 51:49 or something.
The ole red thumbs are more than welcome to correct me if I am wrong with that calculation?
” I or any man who wants to put themselves forward for election ”
What’s stopping you? I’m not aware that the quotas affect independents.
Where did I say I was independent? But in any event by your logic sexism is ok within party politics? Great logic!
Try reading what it says: “unless the minority sex among their candidates”
So if a party puts forward fewer women than men, women are the minority sex, and at least 30% of their candidates across the country must be women.
If someone started a party that was mostly women, the minority sex would be men, and at least 30% of that party’s candidates across the country would have to be men.
In practice, it’s probably women who have to be at least 30% of candidates, but that’s because, AFAIK, no party is runs 50% female candidates, never mind over 50%. Looks like People Before Profit came closest in the last election, with 4 women and 5 men.
Independent, because you said “puts themselves forward for election”. You only get to do that if you’re an independent.
If you want to be a party candidate, you’ve got to convince the party to put you forward. Gosh, I wonder if sexism in party politics has contributed to the lack of female candidates so far?
@mollydot
I don’t think it has, considering at the General Election 2011 18% of party candidates were women and only 9% of independents. If anything it seems party politics is advantageous to women.
This is the biggest load of Baloney I have ever heard of!
If you are good enough you will be deemed good enough by the Electorate.
But you’ve got to get that far. What if you’re good enough, but sexism in a party’s candidate selection means you don’t get put forward for election? The electorate don’t get to decide then.
Which party has a sexist selection process, since they all passed this bill with no external pressure from voters?
Name a party you’re 100% sure doesn’t.
The ones that proposed the legislation, wrote it, and voted it in. And whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty? Can you name a party that has sexist tendencies?
We live in a sexist society. People have biases, even if they try not to. People who are trying to hire a more diverse workforce are still unknowingly biased against hiring black people* So having anti-sexist policies doesn’t mean a group has no sexism.
* Can’t find the study I came across before, but did find this: http://www.chicagobooth.edu/capideas/spring03/racialbias.html , which found that even places that claimed to be equal opportunities or practices affirmative action were racist in their hiring practices.
Molly, you’re talking nonsense. Firstly, you’re asking him to prove a negative. Secondly, there is no evidence of any anti-female bias in a major party’s selection process. Quite the opposite is the case.
At the last general election there were 176 independent candidates, of whom 8% were female. As you yourself point out further down, there is no selection policy for independents – ergo there is no sexist conspiracy to keep women out.
Of the major parties, FF & FG had around 15% female candidates and Labour had 26%, both far higher than one would expect given the percentage of women amongst the selection policy-less independents. Also, when one takes into account the lower level of female membership in Labour, the impression created is of a party that’s already disproportionately favouring women candidates.
While we’re on the subject, will you be supporting calls for 30-40% of the places at teacher training colleges to be reserved for men, regardless of the quality of their application?
You accuse me of asking him to prove a negative, then you claim a negative in your very next sentence? Do you understand what you’re saying?
Who said anything about a sexist conspiracy?
I can’t see a good reason not to have some sort of measures to improve the male numbers in primary school (most recent numbers I found for secondary had over 40% male teachers anyway). How are teacher training places decided now? If it’s points, or something similar where there cannot be bias at the decision point, then it would probably be better to start with campaigns to encourage men to apply. And check the selection criteria for built in bias – silly example: if you have to be under 5′ 6″, then, all else being equal, more women would get in. If the numbers don’t increase, or worse, if they keep shrinking, then a quota might be the way to go.
What’s the gender breakdown in Labour membership?
@Molly, owned by both chuck and John.
This is ridiculous. Doesn’t matter what sex the person is it matter if they are qualified. Why not introduce a law that you have to be more qualified than a teacher!!! Or that the minister for finance Must have a phd in economics!!!
“the minister for finance Must have a phd in economics!!!”
Hold your horses! Let’s start with “knows how to use a bank account”. Bonus points for “can tell the difference between a loan and a payment”.
Yes David… It does matter what sex a person is. You really believe that only 15% of women in Ireland are as capable of being in an elected office when compared to a man?
Of course you don’t.
So what do those figures tell you? I would suggest that it looks like there is a HUGE bias against women in Irish politics. I think we should take some steps to correct that.
Luckily the law passed also protects male prospective politicians as well.
I dont believe in putting women in office just for the sake of possessing a vagina!!! Introducing quotas doesnt mean that the dail will be made up of more women, they have to be elected first. positive discrimination is still discrimination .
How necessary is a penis?
necessary for screwing the irish people :)
i am not against more women in dail. i just wish they got there on merit and skill instead of a quota system. my fear is we will have a dail full of lucindas or sarah palins and for the sole reason of being a woman!!!
Are you sure all the men in the Dail got there on merit and skill?
I could do without the Lucindas, but I could do without the Healy Raes and the Sherlocks too. Women aren’t innately worse than men.
What a joke but how typical of Labour, showing their meddlesome socialist roots, tinkering with the machinery of democracy when it presents an obstacle to their plans. Gender quotas are a retrograde step for this country. They are fundamentally undemocratic and they undermine the right for parties to select candidates internally and without interference, because a highly ideological, arrogant, patronising yet organised and vocal minority of politicians and lobbyists feel that they know better than voters and that voters should be told how to vote. It is liberal-leftism at its most meddlesome and intrusive.
The advocating political parties could, if they chose to, change their own rules to implement such quotas internally, without signing it into law for everyone. Instead they choose to impose their view of gender balance on other political parties by law. The absurdity of a temporary Dáil majority using taxpayers’ money to bend the rules of democracy so they can manipulate future election outcomes, to suit their own particular agenda, and get the “right people” into power cannot be understated. The electorate can, believe it or not, actually make up their mind about the situation without the meddlesome poking of the Labour/FG ideologues and, at the end of the day, if gender imbalance is not a problem for voters, it isn’t a problem for the government. We are about to enshrine discrimination into the fundamental principles of this state for the first time.
The quota is also predicated on false and incorrect assumptions. It assumes that the gender makeup of an elected body should mirror that of its electorate. The foundation for this assumption is never explained. It also seems to assume that adding more women will automatically improve governance in Ireland, and that men are responsible for all the corruption and incompetence. Beverley Cooper Flynn, Mary Coughlan, and former Fine Gael Councillor Anne Devitt are proof women can be just as incapable and/or corrupt in politics as their male peers.
There are other, arguably more harmful imbalances within the make-up of the current government. Why are we focusing on one? There is an abundance of white, middle and upper-class, Irish, heterosexual male teachers, solicitors, barristers, over the age of 40 in the Dáil. Why aren’t there more representatives for the immigrant population in Ireland? Why is Irish politics a gerontocracy where whoever hangs around the longest gets the power? Why aren’t there more economists, sociologists , accountants and business outsiders who actually know a thing or two about the mechanics of running a government? Nobody seems to be asking these questions.
Quotas will simply tokenise female politicians, giving the impression that they were not selected on merit but on the basis of biology. The question could be raised of whether any Irish politicians are selected on merit, but that’s a different conversation. We’ve had more female representatives in the past than we do today, without quotas, which implies that there are systemic and social causes of the poor number of female Irish politicians that could be addressed unilaterally and internally by political parties. However, I suspect political parties have their own outmoded fears preventing them from doing this.
Lets face it: a gender quota is an unwanted distraction from far, far more serious problems in the Irish state. Maybe the government should spend less time fretting about the gender makeup of 166 well-paid pensionable political jobs and focus more on the absolutely problems facing the country.
“It assumes that the gender makeup of an elected body should mirror that of its electorate. ”
I’m pretty sure that more than 30%, or even 40%, of the population of Ireland is female.
“There are other, arguably more harmful imbalances within the make-up of the current government. ”
Not just the current government. The one I’d like to see gone is the political family one. Why does being the child or sibling of a current or previous TD give you a greater chance of being put forward and voted in?
Garbage politics from a garbage political class.
Gender quotas are part of the liberal flak that’s being ramped up now to take attention away from the shit that we’re in.
Labour especially just love this stuff — let’s them polish their halos while they aid and abet FG in shafting ordinary people on behalf of bankers and big money. When anyone objects they’ll revel in having a massive row and calling their opponents sexist.
Just because supposed liberals promote such an attack on democracy doesn’t mean it is a liberal notion. In fact a quota couldn’t be further from the meaning of the liberal ideal. I would consider myself somewhat liberal in my political outlook, but lets not call this a “liberal” move, cause it’s not, it’s a moronic, knee jerk and undemocratic move supported by supposed liberals who don’t know their arse from their elbow!
Why stop with a gender quota? Why not a minimum number of candidates with disabilities; non-nationals; transgenders; homosexuals; Muslims; young people, middle aged people and the elderly; non-Caucasian etc? This is an anti-democratic piece of legislation which seeks to foist sectional interests upon the electorate. I vote for a candidate on the basis of their AND their political party’s stance on issues which interest me and irrespective of race, colour, creed or gender of that candidate. How is it democratic to deny the electorate their choice of candidate by forcing upon them another candidate simply because that candidate happens to be a woman?
Bah. Reply below.
@mollydot The ignorance of the electorate is not a good reason to restrict choice. Just because some people happen to waste their vote, doesn’t mean that the rest of us can’t be trusted to vote in the ‘right’ candidate. There is potential for able existing male backbench TDs to lose out on a nomination from their own political party at the next general election in favour of a less able candidate simply because that candidate happens to be a woman so as to satisfy a gender quota. Can you imagine the reaction from the taxpayer-funded National Women’s Council of Ireland if the converse were true? At least we can rely upon the National Men’s Council of Ireland to give the countervailing viewpoint. Oh wait… there isn’t one!
It’s not just some people. Look at these maps: http://adriankavanaghelections.org/2011/02/03/geography-and-voting-trends-galway-east-constituency/
How is it restricting choice? It may even increase choice, depending on how the parties decide to implement. They could keep the same number of candidates, which changes the choices, but doesn’t restrict; or they could add more women, which increases choice. Or they could do something in between, which changes choices and increases choice. And look! Now you’ll get more opportunity to be gender-blind.
And up till now there’s been potential for an able woman to lose out on a nomination in favour of a less able man because of unconscious bias in the selectors. And there’s still potential for an able, unconnected person to lose out in favour of a less able family member of some TD. Or for an able person to miss out because they live near a current TD in favour of a less able person who lives in another part of a constituency. Or for a pretty able person to not get a nomination because they live in a constituency full of popular people, while a less able person in a crappier constituency can get one.
The thing that gets me about most anti-quota arguments is that they assume everything is perfectly fair without. And the others seem to be saying that there’s a bunch of other things that are unfair, so we can’t try to fix this one. You seem to be managing both!
You see a need for a Men’s Council? Start one. (Also, do you realise that if anyone wanted to start an all-woman party now, they wouldn’t get funding?)
(Correction: wouldn’t get full funding, only 50%)
It has a time limit, it will only be in place for two general elections and then it’s done.
I note all the above comments are from men, some of whom seem terrified of the prospect that some “wimmen” might get into power.
Initially I was against this legislation, for many of the reasons outlined above. In response to some of the b***hing and moaning above:
1) As Sharrow says it will have a de facto time limit. It should be viewed as a blunt instrument. There’s no perfect solution to this problem. All the parties now have an incentive to recruit female members, in a way they have never had before. If we had continued on with no change like this, we would probably have continued to stagnate.
2) Gender is the number one thing which differentiates humans. And when we only have
3) Some are under the impression that this forces voters to elect 30% female TDs. It doesn’t. It forces parties to select 30% female candidates. In many ways party headquarters already set rules on where candidates come from (e.g. one must be from the north of the constituency, one from the south and one from the east).
4) 30% is quite a small limit, compared to other countries who have imposed 50:50 rules on parties.
5) One poster makes the point that the ULA will be badly affected. In fact they are one of the best parties/grouping with 40% of their TDs being female (i.e. Clare Daly and Joan Collins).
I also am disappointed that the implementation of some of the most important recommendations from the Mahon Tribunal have not been commented on yet, in particular:
“The law, assuming it is signed by the President next week, will now also require parties to include details of their local branches in the register of political parties, and also requires the setting up of a new register of corporate donors.”
Ryan (and Sharrow) – Just a point of correction; the terms of this legislation (as far as I can make out, and I’ve just read it) don’t contain any clause that would eliminate the gender quotas part of the legislation within ANY defined time period. It’s a permanent measure.
Ryan, while you probably were making a good point, you lost me a sentence in by being so demeaning and dismissive of people with genuine issues with such an undemocratic and ironically hypocritical move. I have stated many times before that I think if we had more women in politics we probably wouldn’t be so far up the sh**er, however, that does not entitle the state or any individual to promote and enact such a sexist and undemocratic notion!
Paul, nice to see someone actually came up with a reason why they welcomed this bill. Your ideological comrades still seem to be in hiding.
In defence of my b***hing and moaning above:
1) It won’t have a time limit to the best of my knowledge. In fact in 7 years it will be raised to 40%. That’s like the opposite of a time limit.
2) Gender is the one thing that doesn’t affect our political views. Race, immigrant status, religion, age, socio-economic class and profession all affect our political views a lot more than gender.
3) Fair point. But if women are elected just to till the numbers, they won’t necessarily be people that a political party find useful when they get into power, and will be sidelined. It may lead to any given political party or coalition having a smaller talent pool to choose Ministers from.
4) Other countries can be worse than us, it doesn’t make me any happier about it.
5) The ULA are not a party in themselves, they are an umbrella term for the Socialist Party, People before Profit, WUAG and Seamus Healy. If you look at them as a collective party, which they may be come 2016, they only fielded 25% female candidates. 40% got elected (you seem to be adopt the thinking that inspired you to write (3)). And their performance bears no relevance to the point I was making, I still think the Government’s motives are to stifle emerging parties.
And can you please clarify why you said this is a problem that requires a solution. Politics is a job, and like most it will have a gender discrepancy. There’s nothing wrong with that. If I go to court I won’t be upset to have a female lawyer arguing my case, I see no reason why women would be upset to have men arguing their case in the Dail.
Agreed.
3) They’re not even legally compelled to select 30% candidates. If they feel strongly enough about it, they can forego the funding.
5) I hadn’t realised ULA were an umbrella of PBP, SP and WUAG. PBP had the best gender equality in their candidates in the last election. 4 women to 5 men. ULA as a whole though, had 5 women to 14 men, which doesn’t quite make the 30%. One more woman and they would have, though.(numbers from http://www.thejournal.ie/election-candidates-2011/people-before-profit/ ) The major parties, including Labour, will have to do a lot better than that.
I reckon there were no comments on donations because that would have required holding in their knee jerk reactions till they’d read the whole article.
I’m delighted with this bit too:
“It also reduces the limits of how much a politician can accept from any personal or corporate donor in any calendar year.”
Thank you for leaving a sensible comment.
That’s Ryan I agree with, btw!
Brendan,
2) You may well be right, but citation? I’d especially like to know what is meant be “political views”. Is that party you’d vote for, or opinions on specific things?
3) Everyone’s falling for the election instead of candidate things! Women won’t be elected to fill the numbers. No one is forcing anyone to vote for a woman (unlike, as I mentioned in an earlier comment, where people in certain constituencies had no choice but to vote for a man if they were going to vote)
5) I wonder if there’s a minimum number of candidates for the legislation to apply. The donation stuff won’t stifle emerging parties, anyway. Unless it’s a new party built on corruption, but that’s unlikely. *fingers crossed*
Why such a big discrepancy? Why are we so much worse than many other countries? We’re at 15.1%, and this is our best ever. We’ve proportionally half as many women in government as New Zealand. Do you not think it’s possible there might be some issues there? That there might be some unfairness involved, either in decision making or life in general?
The 15.1% in government is roughly the same proportion as were candidates (15.2%). Anyone got numbers for previous years? Do we vote for the same proportion as are available to be elected, or is it just coincidence this year?
@ Gavan: Thanks for the correction. Do you know if an earlier draft included a time limit? I had thought there was a time limit.
@ Diarmaid: That first sentence was directed towards the likes of TurkeysforChristmas and Patrick Minford. Re the move being “undemocratic”, parties already can deprive voters of potential candidates for a myriad of reasons. This is also undemocratic, but is seen as acceptable as parties need to maximise the chances of getting candidates elected.
@ Brendan: Firstly I’m generally right of centre on most topics, so I have to admit laughing out loud at being referred to as a “comrade”.
“Gender is the one thing that doesn’t affect our political views.” Yes it is true that female politicians, just like their male counterparts, can fall anywhere on the left-right spectrum. Indeed the two most powerful female politicians to date (Thatcher and Merkel) have both been centre right ironically. However it isn’t just political views, it is also about the experience a politician brings to the (Cabinet) table.
Yes politics is a job, but the decisions politicians make impact on every single person in this country in some way. No other job has that level of impact. The Oireachtas as a whole only has around 15% female membership. How can well thought out decisions be made when the gender balance is so skewed to one particular side?
Re stifling emerging parties, surely issues like funding and media exposure are far more important. Remember emerging parties won’t be entitled to funding from the public purse until they actually have someone elected. And for established parties with large memberships and a small number of female TDs (e.g. Fianna Fáil has 0 female TDs, FG only has around 8 out of 76) the impact will be far greater. I think you are reading too much into this and trying to develop some sort of conspiracy theory out of thin air.
Re the ULA, I’m anticipating (as the original poster seems to have done) that they will be a political party by 2016.
@Molly
2) Citation is absent I’m afraid, but as an idea it makes sense. My political ideas are wildly different from that of my grandparents, look at a lot of the referenda on abortion and gay marriage, where a lot of the opposition is purported to come from the Catholic section of society. Labour gets a disproportionate amount of the lower class vote, and Fine Fail the older vote. I can’t think of any political debate in this country that ever divided the gender line, or ever hearing something like “Fine Gael usually perform well among the female community.”
3) I’m aware of that but since most people vote by party anyway that point is moot. I voted for Shane McEntee because I want FG in power, not because I wanted Shane McEntee in power.
5) It will stifle emerging parties, or small parties at the very least, Ireland is one of the few countries where political parties can get into the Dail quite easily, it’s not good to change that.
We have such a big discrepancy because politics is a job. It’s no worse than teaching or nursing discrepancies, or discrepancies in academia or medicine. No one cares about them, why should we care about politicians? Am I to assume that schools are discriminating against men, or that universities are sexist in their choice of doctoral students? We pay people to sweep our streets, service our cars, and run our countries affairs. I couldn’t give a toss about the gender profile of those jobs. If sexism is proven, come down on them hard, but don’t introduce quotas as some sort of half-baked response to a problem that hasn’t even proved its existence.
@Ryan Unfortunate choice of words I know, but that’s my fault for trying to be eloquent.
And what experiences do women have that’s different to men, that supercedes age, profession and all those other groups I mentioned?
Teachers have a much bigger impact on citizens than politicians. So do journalists realistically. Politicians just do what they think will make us happy enough to vote for them in 5 years time, and half of those voters are women. And who’s to say men, or women, can’t come up with a well thought out idea by themselves? Quite a lot of us come up with well thought out ideas by ourselves all the time.
Regarding emerging parties, another main issue is a smear campaign against a smaller party who fails to meet the quota. Maybe I am reading too much into it, but I’m skeptical that the government’s motives are pure with this one.
Brendan,
2) Heh. I was thinking it could be that voting would follow race, socio-economic, religion, etc, but not gender (or age) because many people would follow their parents’ example, but gender is spread out amongst the other groupings. But your example serves as a counter example to that!
However, I did find this, which says that the gap is usually small: http://adriankavanaghelections.org/2011/06/06/is-there-a-%E2%80%98gender-gap%E2%80%99-in-irish-voting-behaviour-looking-at-ge-2011/
I wish I knew more about statistics. I wonder if the bigger female vote switching is significant. If you’re not the incumbents, are you better off chasing female votes than male?
3) The bigger parties often have more than one candidate in a constituency, and which one gets more first preferences may well make a difference.
5) Why would it stifle smaller parties?
The ULA and Labour both fielded 26.x% female candidates. Why would it be harder for the ULA to increase to 30%? If they field one more woman, keeping all the other candidates the same, they’ll manage it
(adding number for easier discussion)
6) There certainly are people worrying about discrepancies in teaching and academia. Pretty sure there are in medicine and nursing too.
Looks like primary school teaching is as bad as TDs, and getting worse (or is it? http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/education/8550506.stm ), but funnily enough, while nearly half of primary principals are men, we haven’t had any women as Taoiseach yet, never mind half of recent ones.
Secondary school teaching is nowhere near as unbalanced in the most recent numbers I found (2005), more like 45% male. And twice as many male principals as female.
Nursing is worse, at 11% male. Can’t find numbers, but I’ve heard that, again, men are overrepresented in the higher positions.
I’ll leave it up to you to back up your other claims with numbers.
“I’m skeptical that the government’s motives are pure with this one.”
I have to quote your earlier comment: “whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty?” :-)
Mary Lou for Taoiseach
Anything to shift the buck away from the job they are suppose to be doing , get people talking about something stupid and they will forget the real problems we face today the country is in ruins the people are broke and the government are only interested in new ways of robbing what little one might have left be it a wedding ring or an engagement ring you have to sell it and give them the money , nothing but a mob of gangsters running the country guided by the germans.
Interestingly, I saw a post a short while ago suggesting random selection (like jury duty) to represent us. It’s statistically much more likely to be fair. And I imagine we’d end up with a lot less corruption.
“How is it democratic to deny the electorate their choice of candidate by forcing upon them another candidate simply because that candidate happens to be a woman?”
Are you mistaking candidates being fielded for TDs being elected? I wasn’t aware that the electorate got to chose who was available to be voted for.
” I vote for a candidate on the basis of their AND their political party’s stance on issues which interest me and irrespective of race, colour, creed or gender of that candidate”
Bully for you. Lots of people vote based on where the candidate lives. So much for “best person for the job”.
More info on the donation limits: http://www.environ.ie/en/LocalGovernment/Voting/News/MainBody,29019,en.htm
Does any one know if there’s a minimum party size, or rather, number of candidates, for the quotas to apply to? Eg, WUAG had only candidate in the last election. It’s a bit hard for one person to be both 30% male and 30% female.
have your say