Girl Power in the Corridors of Power

Fine Gael Senator Frances Fitzgerald has been lamenting the lack of ‘Girl Power’ in Leinster House – and she’s right.

“The current situation in relation to female representation in the Dáil and
Seanad is a disgrace for our representative democracy and even more so when consideration is given to the fact that our ranking in world terms has slipped 50 places over the last three general elections, from 36th place in 1997 to 60th place in 2003 and 87th in 2007,” she tells us.

And its sad but true.

Out of a possible 166 Dail seats, female TDs fill just 22 (13%) of them – a figures that has risen by a meagre 1% in the last 10 years.

“In Countess Markevich, Ireland once had the first female Cabinet Minister in Europe Our figures on women’s political representation are now comparable with the countries of the Pacific and Sub-Saharan Africa, rather than those of our European counterparts and averages for America and Asia,” she said.