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A Cheann Comhairle,

I am pleased to present to the House the Government’s response to recommendations of the Second Report of Convention on the Constitution. The Government welcomes this Second Report and continues to be encouraged by the engagement of the participants in the process, as evidenced again in the most recent meeting which took place just two weeks ago to discuss the topic of “giving citizens resident outside the State the right to vote in Presidential elections at Irish embassies, or otherwise”.

Deputies will know that the Convention on the Constitution was tasked to consider, and make recommendations as it sees fit, in relation to “amending the clause on the role of women in the home as well as encouraging their greater participation in public life” and “increasing the participation of women in politics” and this is the subject matter of the Second Report.

Establishment of the Convention on the Constitution was approved by resolution of the Houses of the Oireachtas in July 2012. The Resolution establishing the Convention requires Government to provide its response to each recommendation of the Convention within four months and, if accepting the recommendation, to indicate the timeframe it envisages for the holding of any related referendum. Because of the summer vacation, this is the first opportunity I have had to report on behalf of Government to the House in relation to the report which we received in May and on which a reply was due while we were in recess.

The commitments in the Programme for Government in relation to these two issues reflect the fact that Ireland has changed significantly since the Constitution was passed in 1937. While women have always played a central role in the family, over 975,000 women are now also active in the labour market. Of these, over 500,000 have children and therefore additional caring responsibilities. A further significant number of adults, both men and women, have caring responsibilities for older parents and other adult dependents.

We know from research that we need to encourage greater sharing of family responsibilities among the partners in the family unit. Indeed this is a stated goal of EU gender equality policy.

At the same time, EU economic policy also encourages Member States to take all necessary steps to increase the labour market participation of women, noting, in particular, that across Europe and, indeed, in Ireland, the female population has now achieved higher standards of education than their male counterparts. Indeed we, in Ireland, are to the forefront in the EU at present in relation to numbers of female graduates and we must ensure that these women have every opportunity to advance their careers, while also sharing, with their partner, the caring role for their families.

The Programme for Government includes specific recommendations to advance the role of women in public and political life as well as the commitment to examine the language in the Constitution. As a Government we are also actively implementing the National Women’s Strategy, which, although it pre-dated our tenure in office, affords a clear vision to

· Equalise socioeconomic opportunity for women

· Ensure their well-being and

· Engage women as equal and active citizens

The implementation of this cross-Departmental Strategy, which contains more than 20 objectives and 200 actions, is overseen by my Department and has already seen many positive developments for the betterment of the lives of women in Ireland and the narrowing of some key gaps in gender equality, particularly in relation to employment, health care and better cross Departmental and cross Agency co-ordination of services to address violence against women and human trafficking.

A Cheann Comhairle, I will now turn to the recommendations in the Convention’s Second Report and give the Government’s response to each.

As I mentioned, in its deliberations, the Convention was tasked to deal with two specific issues. Its deliberations on these issues led to votes on two additional propositions, namely: the possible incorporation of gender equality as a principle in the Constitution and the possible amendment of its text to include gender-sensitive language.

I am turning first to the original issue of the language on “women in the home” within our Constitution. This language had been examined critically on a number of occasions over the past 20 years, including by the Second Commission on the Status of Women (1992), the Constitution Review Group (1996), the All-Party Oireachtas Committee on the Constitution (2006) and the UN Committee which oversees the implementation of the UN Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against Women, known as the CEDAW Convention adopted in 1979 and which Ireland ratified in 1985.

While the Convention on the Constitution did not offer an alternative text in its Report, a majority of its members favoured changing the clause to make it “gender-neutral” and made the further recommendation to include “other carers in the home” and “to include carers beyond the home”. On a continuum, a majority of participants at the Convention also recommended that the State should offer a “reasonable level of support” to ensure that those to whom the newly constructed amendment should apply ‘‘shall not be obliged by economic necessity to engage in labour.’’

Government Response

The Government accepts the first recommendation of the Report in relation to the need to amend the language in Article 41.2 of the Constitution on the role of women in the home. Government is mindful that a number of wordings have been proposed previously in this regard and commits to examine these proposals and other options with a view to finding the most appropriate wording to present in a forthcoming Referendum. Full account will be taken of the comments of the Convention including those in relation to carers.

The inclusion of a reference by the Convention to the issue of “carers” is the reason why it is not possible to offer a more specific timeframe for a Referendum to take on board the overarching Recommendation at this time. Extensive consultations will be necessary, including with Government colleagues and their officials, in relation to these new elements and to the appropriate choice of language for incorporation into the Constitution.

With this in mind, I am establishing a task force in my Department to look at these issues, collaborating with other Departments and the Office of the Attorney General as necessary, with a view to completing the task and reporting back to Government by 31 October 2014.

Women in Public Life and Politics

The second issue examined by the Convention on the Constitution was the encouragement of greater participation by women in public life and increasing their participation in politics. The Convention Report advises that the question of a constitutional provision for this purpose was narrowly defeated but that a significant majority of Convention members recommended more Government action in this area.

Both the Treaties of the European Union and the CEDAW Convention allow for temporary special measures to address deficits in gender equality.

The Government accepts the recommendation of the Convention that the Constitution should not be amended to address the role of women in political and public life.

However, we are also aware that, despite some 40 years of equality legislation in Ireland, women are still significantly under-represented in political life, in senior management and corporate governance roles. In all of these fields, women’s representational levels in Ireland are both below the EU average and the majority of other EU Member States.

Ireland is ranked 24th out of 27 Member States in relation to women’s representation in the Lower House of Parliament. The published average data excluded Croatia.

In relation to corporate boards, for which the Commission is currently proposing specific actions, we rank among the poorest in terms of female representation, at just over 8 per cent for membership of the boards of top stock exchange companies. The EU average is close to 15 per cent and the proposed EU target is 40 per cent by 2020. And yet we have, as I mentioned earlier, a very well educated female work force. We know that women’s representation on State Boards is better at 34 per cent but this has flat-lined at that level for the past five or six years.

Current work on women in decision-making roles including in politics.

In responding, I should remind the House that the current Programme for Government includes a commitment to increase the role of women in political life and in decision-making.

As Minister for Equality, I welcome the appointment by the Government, over the last two and a half years, of talented and skilled women to top positions, many within the area of law and justice, including our Attorney General, Maire Whelan; Chief Justice Susan Denham; the President of our District Court Judge Rosemary Horgan, our Director of Public Prosecutions Claire Loftus and Deputy Garda Commissioner Noirin O’Sullivan.

Over the past two and a half years 40% of appointments made to the judiciary have been women and 60% have been men. On Wednesday next, two members of the High Court, Judges Mary Laffoy and Elizabeth Dunne, whose appointments have already been announced, will become Judges of the Supreme Court. By this day week, there will have been four appointments by this Government to the Supreme Court, two men and two women, a gender balance of 50/50. In saying this, it is important to also state that each appointment has been made on merit but what I and the Government have sought to ensure is that gender is not some subconscious invisible barrier which gets in the way of, or prevents, the appointment of talented and skilled women to important public positions and positions of leadership. In the context of our courts, at the time of my appointment as Minister for Justice, Equality and Defence I believed it was important that we achieve a better gender balance. Huge progress has been made in this regard over the last 2 years and at leadership level there is now full gender equality in that two of our top judges, the President of the District Court and the Chief Justice are women and two, the Presidents of the Circuit and High Court, are men.

A number of important initiatives have been completed or are ongoing and these will be built on throughout the life of this Government including:

The all-Party conference on Women and Politics hosted by my colleague, Minister of State Kathleen Lynch TD on 30 January 2012. This event attracted over 300 participants and fostered greater awareness of the issue and the challenges for political parties and the public. The Conference heard from the political and administrative leaders of all the main political Parties, including the Taoiseach and Tánaiste and Deputies Martin and Mary Lou McDonald, together with the Chairperson of the Green Party. It also heard the experiences of a number of serving politicians and words of wisdom and guidance from a number of international experts.

The amendment to the Electoral (Amendment) (Political Funding Act) in 2012 which requires political parties to include a quota of 30 per cent of women candidates at the next general election, rising to 40 per cent at the following general election. Failure on the part of a political party to comply with this legislative provision will lead to a cut in State funding to parties.

A working group chaired by Minster of State Kathleen Lynch T.D. in the context of the National Women’s Strategy. This Working Group has been specifically addressing the advancement of women in leadership roles, including in politics, management, on Boards, in the diplomatic and judicial systems. Its Report will be completed shortly.

A wide ranging positive action programme will start later this year on “women and leadership” which is being generously supported over a two year period by the European Social Fund PROGRESS initiative.

The reiteration in the Programme for Government that all state boards have at least 40 per cent of each gender. This was backed up further in April 2011 when Government decided that future vacancies on state boards would be advertised on the website of the relevant Government Department.

I would like to assure the House that the Government is fully committed to this ongoing work, which, as I said, is linked to the aims in the Programme for Government.

Including an Explicit Provision in the Constitution on Gender Equality

I already mentioned that the Convention on the Constitution voted on two further issues and I must now also comment on these. The first was a recommendation, based on a majority of 62% of Convention Members, which recommended that “the Constitution should be amended to include an explicit provision on gender equality”.

The Government is of the view that, while this proposal has merit, and has links with the clauses in the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, it requires further examination.

The Government has asked the Department of Justice and Equality to initiate this review, in consultation with other Departments and the Office of the Attorney General as appropriate, with a view to bringing a reasoned response back to Government by 31 October 2014.

While there are complexities in formulating an appropriate constitutional amendment along the lines of that proposed by the Constitutional Convention, central to the Convention’s recommendation is the achievement of gender equality and giving equal recognition and importance to the role played by men and women in the home. Whilst Article 41.2, in its original conception in 1937, was perceived as providing a form of constitutional protection for women, in reality it not only failed to achieve that objective but became widely understood as exhorting women to remain in the home and discouraging them from engaging in the work force. It was part of the philosophy that resulted in women in the public service being required to give up their employment upon marriage. The Article also failed to provide any substantive benefit to women in the home or to extend to them any constitutional protections when they exclusively assumed home duties. This was starkly illustrated in a Supreme Court decision delivered in 1993 in a case entitled “In re The Matrimonial Home Bill 1993” in which a Bill, the objective of which was to confer an automatic joint ownership interest in the family home on wives, was held to be unconstitutional as violating the property rights of husbands.

We are now in a new era with a greater and better understanding of the roles of both men and women within the home and in the wider community and of the equality of rights and obligations of both men and women. In drafting a new constitutional amendment it is crucial that we provide for a form of wording that reflects today’s understandings in the context of today’s Ireland and that it is a form of wording that has widespread public support. It also must be a form of wording that does not have unintended consequences and does not impose financial obligations on the State which would ultimately fall on taxpayers and which we cannot afford.

Whatever wording is ultimately adopted will apply, of course, to all citizens in the State and to all who reside in the State, to both long standing communities and to our new communities. In this context it is, I think, appropriate to acknowledge the role being played by the new immigrant communities in the State which include the many thousands who have joyously attended and participated in the many Citizenship Ceremonies held over the past two years. These communities come from many different states and embrace many different cultures and, in each of the ceremonies held, they have been encouraged to remain in touch with their own cultures whilst also embracing the culture of this State, its democratic values and to fully participate in their local communities. In the context of what we are discussing here today it is, of course, important that full participation extends to all men and all women and the road we are now travelling will be of relevance to all. It is, of course, central to the equality agenda that all men and all women have equal opportunities and the freedom to avail of those opportunities.

Including “gender-inclusive” language

A further issue on which the Convention on the Constitution voted was whether the text of the Constitution should be amended to include gender-inclusive language. This motion attracted an overwhelming “yes” vote with 89 per cent of the members voting to accept the proposal. Government has now considered this supplementary recommendation and notes the views of the Convention and an earlier and similar view expressed by the UN CEDAW Committee.

Government is of the view that this proposal needs further consideration, not least because, if implemented, it may require extensive textual amendments to the Constitution. Accordingly, the Government has tasked the Department of Justice and Equality to undertake a preliminary feasibility/scoping study before it considers the recommendation further.

While the recommendations of the Convention on the Constitution are not at variance with the Government’s thinking, their recommendations raise a number of complex matters which require further clarification and examination.

Conclusion

The European Union’s economic policy strongly emphasises the need to further increase female labour market participation and has set an employment target of 75 per cent for men and women across the EU by 2020. Because of our economic downturn, the Irish target is lower, but if it is to be achieved it is essential that female labour market participation increase significantly in the coming years.

The EU’s gender equality policy places considerable emphasis on the sharing by men and women, fathers and mothers, of the caring responsibilities within the family, be it childcare or eldercare. Its policies also favour the advancement of women into decision-making roles, in management, in politics and on corporate and decision-making boards.

To fully address the complexities of the modern economic world, we need to fully exploit the decision-making skills of both men and women. We know from an emerging body of research that collaborative decision-making - decision-making based on the collective use of male and female thinking - is the most successful decision-making. I have already mentioned the work being carried out in my Department to fully advance this goal in Ireland.

Minister Kathleen Lynch and I hosted a conference during our Presidency on the issues of women’s economic engagement and work as decision-makers and the EU’s economic policy. We heard convincing arguments from the OECD, European Commission, European Parliament and a range of academics and senior managers of the economic case to support gender equality and the imperative to increase women’s labour market participation to foster Europe’s economic growth and competitiveness.

We have a summary clip on our website www.genderequality.ie and will be publishing a report on the conference on the same website within a fortnight.

This conference offers a clear statement of how the role of women has changed across Europe and indeed in Ireland. As a result, we need to ensure that our Constitution adequately reflects the many roles which women now play in Irish society. While we take these positive steps towards gender equality, I look forward to an Ireland of the future where these discussions will be viewed retrospectively with a sense of incredulity that they were ever necessary, the same sense of incredulity which today greets descriptions of the marriage bar which formerly required women to resign their positions in the public service.

By way of conclusion, I would like to thank the Convention on the Constitution for their constructive approach in their work on the issues relating to gender equality. I am promising to work through the wording issues and matters raised by the Convention which require further detailed consideration within a year. In the interim, I can give you the Government’s tacit commitment to implement the key recommendation and to further enhance the role of women in our society.