Oireachtas gets a ‘woke-up’ call

The Oireachtas has received what one TD branded a ‘woke-up call’ after gender-specific language was stripped away from its Standing Orders.

Nearly 100 changes were made to the key rules that organise the entire business of the national parliament.

The rules of conduct for the

Dáil and Seanad, known as Standing Orders, were investigated as part of an initiative announced by the Ceann Comhairle in January, amid growing concern over the ongoing excessive masculinity of the Oireachtas.

Now, three decades after Ireland’s first equality minister Mervyn Taylor said he was ‘convinced that the present predominance of the masculine gender in our legislation is distorted and offensive to women’, the Oireachtas has finally reformed its own proceedings.

At the January meeting, the Committee on Standing Orders and Dáil Reform agreed in principle to ‘refer to a genderneutral Chair throughout Standing Orders’.

The decision was also taken by consensus to ‘use the term ‘Cathaoirleach’ in place of Chairman, Chairperson and Chair, and so on.

One source noted: ‘It was decided to use the term Cathaoirleach for etymological reasons. Nouns such as Cathaoirleach are gender neutral when it comes to the Irish language.’

After just under two months of investigations, a report to the Committee revealed that the gender inappropriate phrase of Chair and Chairman has had to be excised from 50 Standing Orders – at least 97 occasions.

The report also noted that they have chased out phrases as diverse as Chairman, Deputy Chairman, Temporary Chairman.

Subsequently, the Ceann Comhairle confirmed: ‘Following a review of Standing Orders, the Committee agreed, on 4 March 2021 that the amendments to the Standing Orders of Dáil Éireann ...be made.’

One male TD noted: ‘It’s been a bit of a woke-up call for us all, but the sisterhood Saint Patricias have chased the male snakes out of Standing Orders.’