Conference to explore lack of women in politics in Ireland

Published: Thursday, August 19, 2010

Reviewing women's political representation in Ireland will be the focus of a conference taking place at UCC next month. UCC Women's Studies in conjunction with the Political Studies Association of Ireland (PSAI) will present the one day conference 'Moving in from the Margins: Women's political representation in Ireland' on Saturday 18 September.

Recent Oireachtas reports have recommended the introduction of a variety of measures to increase the number of women in Irish politics. Currently, there are only 23 women in Dáil Éireann accounting for 13.85 per cent of all seats. The figures for Seanad Éireann are only marginally better where 12 of the 60 senators (20 per cent of the seats) are women.

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Click here to listen to Mary O Rourke and Ivana Bacik debate the issue on BBC 4 Women's Hour.