Open letters to the next Dail from The Women’s Podcast

This week on The Women’s Podcast we asked women to think about the future, when the votes have been cast and the election posters are down, and write letters to the next Dail Eireann.

Our letter-writing guests talked about topics close to their hearts, from health to business to direct provision. They outlined what they would like to see done by those politicians returned as TDs and the ones voted in for the first time.

Social justice campaigner Alice Leahy had a lot to say about access to State services, local authority housing and struggling families.

Comedian Tara Flynn’s letter reminded the new Dail of a topic that has been raised on the doorsteps with more frequency than perhaps during any other election: abortion.

The writer Ruth Fitzmaurice spoke from her perspective as a mother of five young children and wife of filmmaker Simon Fitzmaurice, who has motor neuron disease and requires 24-hour care in their home.

Also on the podcast, a host of other issues the letter-writers hope TDs and ministers will be grappling with, including Nadege Doyle’s letter about the barriers to education faced by non-Catholic children.

Direct provision campaigner Ellie Kisyombe wrote: “It makes economic sense to see people as contributors to Irish society rather than keeping them caged and stripping them of the fundamental things that make us human.”

Mary Duffin, one of the members of the Waking the Feminists movement, talked about her passion: drama and its inclusion in the education system.

George Boyle, architect and founder of the Fumbally Exchange in Dublin, spoke about why support is crucial for small businesses and creative entrepreneurs. And Irish emigrant Vanessa Monaghan, who lives in London, had a lot to say to the men and women with the power to change things from her vantage point outside of the country.

Next week The Women’s Podcast presents a special episode from the Rotunda Hospital in Dublin. ’Birth of a Nation’ is a 1916 themed episode, exploring the role of our maternity hospitals in the rising and looking at what lay ahead for baby girls born during the revoloution.

This week’s podcast question is also maternity related: What one item would you tell a woman she absolutely has to bring in her overnight hospital bag when going in to give birth? What did you bring that you could not have done without?

Tell us what you think by emailing thewomenspodcast@irishtimes.com or messaging us on Facebook or Twitter @ITWomensPodcast.

Individual episodes of the podcast are available on Soundcloud, iTunes, Stitcher and on irishtimes.com.