Laura Dowling

And ultimately, every second thing I talk about now is those M's.

This is an official ask.

Research tells us women do not get into politics because they haven't been asked.

Yeah, correct.

So in Parliament now, in comparison to last mandate, we dropped a percentage in female representation.

So we're just under the 38 percent.

Ireland, we've certainly dropped percentages.

It's not like women are not running.

If you are thinking, anybody, you or anybody else, there's two great organisations that we do a lot of work with, Women for Election or See Her Elected.

Fantastic organisations that support women to understand the political acumen, what constituency look like, how to write policy, what are the big issues that are impacting the 51% of the population, health being, of course, a big one, and then how to build that confidence.

And a lot of it is cash,

confidence, campaign structure, being put into seats last minute as the token candidate and let you off and you probably won't win.

But we'll see to then not having the support system.

So if you and I were sisters, you know, I'd come in and say, oh, my God, the party just asked me to run.

And you might have like you or my mom being like, are you?

Absolutely.

What are you doing?

So the confidence piece ripples and then it just takes longer for women to agree to come on tickets.

And the issue with that is, to your point, like we just don't have balanced representation.

And if there is one image that I hope pisses people off, because it certainly pisses me off, it is that picture of a government.