A GREEN Party MEP has called for women in Cork to ‘put their hands up’ and get involved as candidates in forthcoming local, European and Dáil elections.
race O’Sullivan, who was elected as an MEP in Ireland South in 2019, said that just 14 of the 55 councillors elected to Cork County Council in 2019 were women while only seven female councillors were elected to Cork City Council out of a total complement of 31 elected members. While there are two female MEPs representing the Ireland South constituency in the European Parliament not one Cork Dáil constituency has a female TD.
“While a slight increase in this figure has come with the co-option of female councillors throughout the council term, it is still far below where a representative democracy should be,” said Ms. O’Sullivan, who was speaking in advance of International Womens’ Day on Wednesday.
The MEP said that she had never thought of herself as a politicians, describing herself as an environmental activist and mother of three daughters, prior to getting a call from Green Party leader Eamon Ryan in late 2013 asking me to get involved.
“I almost laughed down the phone at him,” she said. “It took a few more phone calls for me to finally take that step forward, and I’ve been quite lucky since then to have a relatively successful political career.
“If I hadn’t received that push then, from within the Green Party and from my family and friends, I wouldn’t be standing here today, and some of the legislation I have led on would not be enacted in the way that it has.”
While her first run for the European Parliament in the 2014 elections was unsuccessful, she was subsequently elected to the Seanad and in 2019 won the European Parliament seat, pipping Sinn Féin’s sitting MEP, Liadh Ní Riada, in the process.
“While gender quotas for general elections have been introduced, and will rise to 40% of candidates being from either gender from this year, no such obligation exists for council elections, where many politicians are first elected.
“While gender quotas for general elections have been introduced, and will rise to 40% of candidates being from either gender from this year, no such obligation exists for council elections, where many politicians are first elected.
The MEP pointed out that pay conditions for local councillors had been improved recently and said that maternity leave for councillors was being progressed through the Oireachtas.
She praised the work of Women for Election, an organisation dedicated to increasing female involvement in representative politics, which she said had done an ‘excellent job’ in building up candidates across all parties to run for office.
She said this had resulted in more gender focused policy being passed into legislation.
“This includes the expansion of free contraception for women under 30 here in Ireland, and the Pay Transparency Directive in the European Parliament which will help us to eliminate the gender pay gap,” the MEP said
“When we elect more women, we get better policies for society in general.”
She said that there still many deterrents which prevented women from running and being elected to public office, including societal expectations of motherood and caregiving and she referred specifically to the online abuse sent to female public representatives.
“It’s important here that we support each other, encourage our colleagues to continue with their work, and work together to reduce this gendered abuse.
“I want to particularly encourage women in rural areas to put themselves forward, where we are particularly under-represented at the moment.”
The MEP is hosting an open event entitled ‘Hands Up” on Saturday to encourage women to get more involved in politics. The event, which is to include a panel discussion and networking afternoon, is aimed at ‘exploring the reality of political life’ for women in politics. How that could involve environmental activism will also be part of the discussion 2for the event which is to take place at Ms. O’Sullivan’s constituency office on Washington Street from 3pm.
