New girls on the block

"I'VE been dreading it all year but it's turning out to be great craic," says Clare Daly (29), an Aer Lingus worker who is standing in Dublin North for the Socialist Party. She is just one of a number of women candidates throughout the country who are standing for election for the first time. Most parties (except, most notably, the Workers' Party and Sinn Fein) are running first time women candidates.

Clare (who was on the Labour executive at the age of 18 and was expelled at 21 as a "militant") is younger than her peers, most of whom are at least in their 30s or older. Another youngster is Joanne Harmon, a computer saleswoman, who is 26, standing for Fine Gael in Dublin West. Like Clare, she is remarkably amazed "by the whole adventure. I don't see myself as jumping in at the deep end. I got involved in Young Fine Gael when I was 17." She notes that there is no female TD in Dublin under 40. There is room for women and men my age in the Dail. Youngest of all must be Maria Ni Dhomhnaill (24) who is running for the Natural Law Party in Galway West.

Despite panty differences the newer faces range from Brid Smith of the Socialist Workers' Party (SWP) and Monique Federsel of the Greens to Theresa Heaney of the National Parts and the Independent. Christine Buckley: not to mention all the main parties - the concerns of these women are surprisingly similar. Health (especially women's health), education, the environment, drugs and crime, job creation, the need for more and better refuges for battered women, the need for State funded creche facilities and the protection of children are mentioned with passionate fervour by all. Those in the west mention emigration and migration to Dublin as another concern.

Independents aside, the others see it as an advantage to be a member of a political party and are very loyal to their support base. Most would not have even considered standing for election unless it had been proposed to them by their party.

Marion Gaffney (42), the Labour candidate for Longford/ Roscommon, is an example: "I joined the Labour party in 1992 and was asked if I would be a candidate in this election. I thought about it for a long time before I accepted. This area has had the same TDs for ages. It has been 20 years since there was a woman candidate in Longford/ Roscommon. I'm delighted I decided to run. It is a terrific challenge."

Others such as Deirdre Clupe of Fine Gael in Cork and Beverley Cooper Flynn of Fianna Fail in Mayo, were born into political families where their fathers had high ranking political posts. Beverley (39) is not, strictly speaking, a first timer, as she ran and was defeated in the Mayo by election of 1994. I was beaten, narrowly. It made me, all the more determined to win next time." It has been an advantage, being P. Flynn's daughter ("there is a lot of good will towards him out there"), yet it has also been a challenge to establish her own personality in the shadow of his. Since September she has been on the local county council and has been canvassing for the last six weeks: "I feel better prepared now."

Beverley is a bank manager with National Irish Bank and is pleased to see that many of her school mates more than half of whom had emigrated have returned to the area in the last year. Job creation is a huge issue in Mayo. Last year there were 17,000 jobs created by the IDA and not one of them was for Mayo." She sees politics as a total commitment.

Many of the women going for election were motivated to run their commitment to a single issue, such as Clare Daly who has been spearheading the anti water charges campaign in north Co Dublin for the last three years. A GP, Dr Mary Grehan (who prefers not to give her age) is standing for the Progressive Democrats in Louth and is very anti Sellafield: "We have a high rate of cancer and of miscarriages here also a deficiency of vitamin B12 which is depleted by radiation. I've been researching this since 1980 and supplying, the Department of Health with the information, but the have failed to act on this or inform the British government or the EU, she says.

Niamh Cosgrave (32) is standing for Fine Gael in Dublin Nodh Central. A member of the party since the age of 14, Niamh found out she had Hepatitis C in 1994: "My aim was always to get into politics, but I had put my life on hold because I didn't know what was wrong with me." She is now in remission and is feeling fit and healthy. She believes that "the Government should take responsibility for the legal costs of the Hep C women who decide to go through the courts. They want justice and feel this is the only way.

The issue that fuels Independent Christine Buckley's campaign is the need to look after children. "Children in Ireland are treated like third class citizens. Although they make up one third of the population, they are voiceless and voteless, and one third of their number is involved in crime. We need fully manned family resource centres and affordable play groups. There are 12 year old prostitutes on the streets. It is high time someone stood up for these children. Apart from anything else, we could prevent a lot of crime if we looked after them properly instead of waiting until they do something wrong and dumping them in residential care.

Nine of the Green Party's, 26 candidates are women and eight of these have not run before. Dr Elizabeth Cullen (39) is the Green spokesperson on health and is running in Donegal South West. Like other Greens, she feels particularly strongly about the environment: "Our present way of living is destroying the Earth's resources and spoiling our quality of life. I can't believe I'm standing for election but I feel so strongly about this I felt I had to do it." She is using her savings to fund her campaign.

FIRST time women candidates from the smaller parties are often fired by their disillusionment with what the larger parties are doing. Theresa Heaney (33) is running for the National Party in Cork South West because she is "frustrated with politics in Ireland at the moment. I saw a lack of democracy in the divorce referendum - which nearly half the people voted against - and in the denial of another abortion referendum. The politicians are no longer listening to the people. The family in this country is being undermined. I'm a mother in the home and I have two daughters (aged two and seven), and I feel I'm doing a valuable job that is not being recognised."

"The TDs in the Dail now might have a great education and be great speakers but they don't live in the real world, says, a Socialist Party first timer, Lisa Maher (40) who is running in Dublin South. "They haven't a clue about how real people live, people like me. I'm separated and I reared three children on my own. I do voluntary work in my community with teenage boys who are on heroin.

Motivation is high with all these women, even though, only a handful have a hope of winning a seat. Women in the smaller parties have had to rely on their own funds and the fund raising efforts of their - supporters to gather together the means to run their campaigns.

"We organise fundraisers and we get money from our supporters says Brid Smith. "We are always working towards changing things from below and the election won't change that, whether or not we get elected.

"It takes sacrifice to do good work," says Theresa Heaney. Other parties will have the spin doctors and the big financial backing. We rely on prayer and our Christian values." Marion Gaffney is on leave without pay from work to do her canvassing: "I've always tried to help people out. This area has been neglected too long. I'm meeting people face on. I've never been one to shrink from hard work." Lisa Maher adds that women have the advantage because "we are better fighters and we take stress better".

Lisa notes that male candidates can just get up and go out to canvass while the women have to do "a double job - you have to look after your home, do the washing, the dishes". However, at least half of these women have husbands or partners, most of whom have taken time off from work to help with the campaign.

"They say every politician - needs a good wife - well, I have a good mother in law," jokes Niamh Cosgrave, who has three sons, the youngest of whom is only, six months old.

"I'm a believer in the seven year cycle, concludes Monique Federsel (39), the, Green who is standing in Dublin South West. Seven years ago I gave birth to my son in the Coombe. I look forward to celebrating his seventh birthday in the Dail."