"Taoiseach now faces wrath of the Angry Birds"

Brendan Burgess

Brendan Burgess

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In almost every report I heard of the junior ministers yesterday, they commented that FG had no female junior ministers.

This is the headline in today's Irish Times

Taoiseach now faces wrath of the Angry Birds


Kenny overlooked his female TDs’ claims for junior ministries


If my calculations are correct, women have a much higher representation than men in the cabinet?

Fine Gael
|TDs|Ministers|
Men|60|8|13%
Women|9|2|22%

Labour
|TDs|Ministers|
Men|30|3|10%
Women|7|2|28%


Combined
|TDs|Ministers|
Men|90|11|12%
Women|16|4|25%

A woman TD is twice as likely to be in the cabinet!
 
Now now, there's an agenda at play and the Feminists are'nt going to let stats get in their way!
Don't hear too many shouting for gender quota's for primary school teachers which is nearly 90% female
 
Delboy said:
Now now, there's an agenda at play and the Feminists are'nt going to let stats get in their way!
Don't hear too many shouting for gender quota's for primary school teachers which is nearly 90% female
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:eek: apostrophe catastrophe :eek:​

Anyhow, who are the talented backbenchers overlooked for these positions ? Name and shame :p.
 
That's a very dubious statistical study Brendan. Using your method, we could have a Dail with one female TD, make her a minister and have 100% female representation at cabinet. We could then tell the world what a fair society we are.

GO SISTERS.......
 
dereko1969 said:
lies, damned lies and statistics......
Click to expand...

I was just going to say that.
Quotas are a bad idea. The best person for the job should get the job (or in our case, the constituency that needs a minister to secure that marginal seat).
 
Sunny said:
That's a very dubious statistical study Brendan. Using your method, we could have a Dail with one female TD, make her a minister and have 100% female representation at cabinet. We could then tell the world what a fair society we are.
Click to expand...

It's a much better study than looking at the number of wimmin Fine Gael Junior Ministers in isolation from everything else, which is my main point.
 
Another Irish Times article on the topic

One young man from each party plucked from the backbenches

Analysis: junior ranks remain mostly male, writes Mary Minihan

The Indo is no better


Snubbed and shocked: Fine Gael women left out in cold

And the Journal.ie

1. Enda fails to solve his women issues
The Taoiseach’s ability to surprise us showed itself again today as he neglected to appoint any Fine Gael women to the junior ministerial ranks despite widespread expectations that at least one of Regina Doherty, Mary Mitchell-O’Connor or Aine Collins would get the nod. Despite being widely praised for appointing Heather Humphreys to the Arts ministry last week, Kenny will not be earning plaudits for ignoring females today.

And the Irish Mirror

Enda Kenny’s decision not to appoint female junior ministers leaves Fine Gael TDs looking at their future in the party
 
But Cameron appointed lots of women and they still were not satisfied

"He could sack his entire Cabinet and replace them with women, and it wouldn’t win him one extra vote," says Platell. "Women hate tokenism, they detect insincerity and they instinctively know a man who will work hard to protect them and their families…"
And with a final stiletto between Dave's legs, she concludes: "Perhaps if our Prime Minister spent more time with real people, with ordinary mums juggling life and budgets and family, rather than his mostly male coterie of chums hand-picked from the same privileged background, he might get more of an inkling of what women want."
 
I am constantly amazed at how more women are not offended by this sort of tokenism.
Despite the sexism and bile in the tone of Amanda Platell’s comments, and the stupid “women “feel” this or that” lines, the point about tokenism is correct; nobody likes being patronized.

The best person for the job should get the job. It’s that simple. I have male friends and female friends. In general terms the men I know are more interested in politics than the women I know (with one of two major exceptions). If fewer women are politically active then fewer will stand for election and fewer will be TD’s and fewer will be appointed ministers. The notion of making politics more female friendly is silly. It is what it is. The hours are terrible and the pressure can be extreme but that’s the case with many fields which women dominate such as medicine and, increasingly, law. The idea that if the job was made easier (or more “family friendly”) then more women would get involved is also patronizing and sexist.
 
Brendan Burgess said:
But Cameron appointed lots of women and they still were not satisfied

"He could sack his entire Cabinet and replace them with women, and it wouldn’t win him one extra vote," says Platell. "Women hate tokenism, they detect insincerity and they instinctively know a man who will work hard to protect them and their families…"
And with a final stiletto between Dave's legs, she concludes: "Perhaps if our Prime Minister spent more time with real people, with ordinary mums juggling life and budgets and family, rather than his mostly male coterie of chums hand-picked from the same privileged background, he might get more of an inkling of what women want."
Click to expand...

Now there's toughie :D
 
When will we get a full quota system in place?
They need to be based on racial background, gender, religious beliefs and sexual orientation. Parties who run a African-Irish Muslim lesbian should not be able to count her 4 times; she should only count against one quota group... Otherwise it would be a stupid idea...
 
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