Taylor-Quinn backs gender quota

ONE of the few women who served as a TD for Clare has backed the idea of introducing gender quotas in the selection of election candidates.
Madeleine Taylor-Quinn served the county as a TD for 11 years, while she was Mayor of Clare from June 2007 to June 2008.
While she has tasted success in her own political career, she feels there are gender-specific obstacles for women. “Undoubtedly there are, there’s no question. It’s a boys’ club, women wouldn’t have the type of camaraderie that men have at going to the bar or the golf club. It’s a boys’ club and the boys are good old chums and women aren’t part of that. To say that you are excluded would be wrong but you wouldn’t be one of the boys.”
The level of participation of women in Irish politics is abysmal, she claimed, and that’s why she favours the introduction of quotas. “The bottom line is that all efforts to date to increase the numbers of women have failed. Fifty percent of the population are women but only 13% of public representatives are. Having that level of imbalance doesn’t augur well for getting the best outcome in Government.”
She claimed that Ireland’s level of female participation is on a par with sub-Saharan Africa, way behind that of comparable European countries.
Ms Taylor-Quinn said that there had been “a level of tokenism” about efforts by the main parties to increase female participation.
She said that early in her career she wouldn’t have favoured the idea of quotas  but that over the years her view had changed as her knowledge and experience of politics grew.
Her party colleague, Clare TD Joe Carey, said that he too agrees with having quotas. “I think that it would be appropriate that there be quotas and there was a very good opportunity to introduce that at the last local elections. We have a policy document called New Politics and we want to increase the number of women in politics.
“It’s only right that people would be given an opportunity to vote for women and the system doesn’t always favour that.”
However, Deputy Pat Breen said that he does not believe the introduction of a gender quota is the way forward. He said in Clare there has been some success in the last local elections with a number of women town councillors elected.
Deputy Breen said that political life can be very demanding. “It is a difficult life and it’s not as attractive as it used to be. It’s a 24/7 job and it can interfere with family life.”
Fianna Fáil TD Timmy Dooley also said he wouldn’t favour gender quotas. He said his party has already carried out research that didn’t favour quotas. “Fianna Fáil did research in the past with an equality officer that was aimed at encouraging equality. Women’s committees were established and they found against having quotas.”
He said that the introduction of quotas would be more suitable if women were getting put forward for elections but not proving successful. “That’s not really the issue at the moment, it’s that women aren’t coming forward.”