Little funding of women in politics

OF €15 million in State funding for political parties, 2 per cent was spent on promoting women’s participation in politics, according to analysis by a new civic movement.

The Claiming Our Future organisation found Sinn Féin and Labour allocated between 6 per cent and 9 per cent of the money available to them over three years to promoting women, while the other parties never spent more than 1 per cent.

Parties must report annually to the Standards in Public Office Commission on how State funding is spent under a number of headings, and one area they can choose is the promotion of participation by women in politics.

A total of €15,160,053 in State funding was spent by the parties in 2007, 2008 and 2009, with €323,364, or 2.13 per cent, allocated to promoting women.

Fine Gael spent 0.39 per cent of its allocated funding, or €17,773 of €4,541,097, on promoting women, while Fianna Fáil’s spend was €29,323 out of €6,094.075, or 0.48 per cent.

The Labour Party allocated 7.87 per cent, or €155,477 of its €1,975,494, while Sinn Féin spent €119,113 of its €1,454,323, or 8.19 per cent. The Green Party’s spend was 0.15 per cent, or €1,678 out of a total of €1,095,064.

The money comes from the parliamentary leader’s allowance and additional funding under the Electoral Act. Parties must report how they distributed the funds under a number of headings. These include: general party administration; research, education and training; policy formulation; co-ordination of the activities of the branches and members of the party; promotion of participation of women; and promotion of participation of young people.

Legislation does not require parties to distribute funding among these headings. More than three-quarters of it is spent on general party administration.

A spokesman for Claiming Our Future said it would call on the new administration to ensure political parties “put a more balanced slate of candidates in front of the people in future elections”.

Among the organisation’s steering group are Niall Crowley, former chief executive of the Equality Authority, Irish Congress of Trade Unions general secretary David Begg, and Social Justice Ireland director Fr Seán Healy.