Republican News · Thursday 25 April 2002

Women in an Ireland of Equals

Pictured outside Leinster House at the women's policy document launch were Aengus O Snodaigh (Dublin South Central) Deirdre Whelan (Dublin South) Gerry Adams, David Cullinane (Waterford) Frances McCole (Dublin North Central) Mairead Keane (Wicklow) and Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin West)

It was sign of change, big change. The press, the cameras, the film crews and the journalists filled a busy press conference in Dublin on Wednesday to launch Women in an Ireland of Equals, a policy document compiled by Sinn Féin's Election Directorate Women's Committee.

The press corps wanted to know what Sinn Féin thought about women, about violence against women, counselling for women in Irish speaking rural areas, about the lack of gender balance in representation in Ireland. That was change.

ne Speed, who heads up Sinn Féin's Women's' Department, chaired the conference with great fluency. She introduced some of the candidates: Deirdre Whelan, (Dublin South) who spoke about the need for government funded child care; Frances McCole, (Dublin North Central), who spoke about the need for early start education for youngsters; Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin West), who spoke about the housing crisis and its affect on women and the high proportion of women who earn below the minimum wage; and Mairead Keane (Wicklow), who spoke of the special burden imposed on women by the unjustifiable two-tier health system. Finally, Lucilita Breathnach, Sinn Fein's Director of Elections, spoke of the National Plan for Women and the need for this to be implemented and monitored by local community groups.

"Normally Sinn Féin is fighting about minority rights - but women's' rights, in an Ireland of Equals, are about majority rights," Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams said. "Women are the majority in our state. It's about changing the balance of power - men have to move over - to make room for women."

Adams referred to a lady from Ballyfermot he had met recently at an exhibition. She had said to him that male authority figures, and she counted Gerry Adams among them, needed to make it clear that violence against women is wrong. "I want to say that now, strongly and firmly," he said.

The policy document was written by Ann O'Sullivan, with input from Valerie Grieve, Anne Speed and Áine ní Gabhain.