I'm

curious Jen about this at the level of how you cope with it, but also about what the results of the elections tell us. And I'm still not sure what that is, but you are very familiar, obviously, with the result of the elections. 25% of the nude, the old, is women. That's just a quarter of an enlarged chamber. Three women are cabinet ministers. Fourteen constituencies are no women TDs at all. Holly Cairns was the only woman across all of Cork to take one of the 20 seats. I think a lot of people are familiar with that, but it still shocks the boots off me. Now, if you look at the numbers of the parties, and this is where I can't get my head around it. So two thirds of two thirds of the women of the Sinn Féin TDs are women. Two thirds. Over half Social Democrats are women. But a third of Fine Gael TDs are women. A quarter of the Labour Party, surprisingly, Marie, are women. Just a quarter. You're looking a bit wryly at me there.

Well, no, well, look.

A sixth of Fianna Fáil are women. Can I start with you, Marie? What is that? What is this about?

Yeah, well, look, and obviously we were very disappointed. Not, you know, we were thrilled with the overall results of taking 11 Dáil seats. And I think we came close in certain constituencies and delighted now that we have two, two female senators who did really well. You know, Nasa Cosgrove and Laura Harmon, who did really well in the general election. And we hope that they go on to do great things in the future. But look, there's no doubt that there is, you know, there remains a huge issue about attracting women into politics. And actually, a big thing for me over the last several years is keeping women in politics. And I think particularly, like, if we don't crack the knot of attracting women into local politics and, you know, to contest the local elections. Then we're not at the races with regards to then the Dáil. And what I have seen over the last number of years is that some great women put themselves forward, getting elected and then having to pack it in after a number of years for a variety of issues. And I think it is that pressure of being a councillor is, you know, it's almost like a full-time job. Many people are trying to balance it with, it should be, but are trying to balance it with a full-time job. So they're trying to do two full-time jobs. And if they've got kids then in the back, you know, alongside it as well. And so that, you know, there's huge issues there about retaining women in politics. And it's on us all to try and ensure that we encourage more women. And so this is always the really difficult thing for me, that we have to be honest about the risks, about the issues for women putting themselves forward online and all of that. But I also say to people, but we can't allow that to deter people either. We have to be careful to say, yes, you know, there are all these issues, there are huge issues. But I always say to people, you know, but try and manage, you know, there's ways of managing some of those risks. And, but ultimately, we need more women in politics and that's the long and the short of it. Jen, you're nodding

vigorously, as is Erin. Jen, what do you, do you put it down to all that? Do you agree wholly? Yeah, I do. I think that it's very difficult. I think it's difficult for anybody

in politics. It's not an easy job. It really isn't. And there's a lot of pressure. And I think if you've got a lot of pressure from other aspects of your life, that can offset, you know, the physical possibility of you being a politician. I think I agree with Marie with regards to the council. I think if that's the starting point for people, it's actually it's actually nearly impossible to balance all those things, to balance being a councillor, which is relentless. It's you know, and you don't have staff as a councillor. Do you know what I mean? You are you are the only person. I don't think people get this about the relentlessness of a councillor. Literally, and the sadness that you see in the emails coming through or with people, like people are in dire straits. You know, Dublin City Council councillors really have a lot, and I'm sure I know only from my own councillor that I was on, the level of need coming in is unbelievable. And I think that it does need to be a full-time job because that means, if that's a starting point for a woman to go, or anybody going into politics, it's very, very difficult if you were then balancing that with your other job because you can't financially afford to balance both. I don't know how many full-time councillors there are, but I would love to see councillors job being full-time. There are a good few, but I don't know how to do it financially. No, but if you've got the pressure of caring or, you know, for older family members, siblings, you know, children, that's, it's very, very difficult. And I think that if that's a starting point and you kind of go, I literally, I can't get to the next bit, which is, you know, more difficult. But I think we need to also encourage women in all aspects of our society so that they can see what difference they're making. And equate that because I don't come from a political background, although I would say that youth work and, you know, school completion programme, youth theatre, they're all political. So it's very political with young people. So even though I don't come from a family of politicians working with young people is political. You know being involved in Force of the Union and things like that you know in movements like Educate Together, those things they're all political in a way. So finding people where they're already making a difference in their community and saying to them you know that's actually what politics is with the big P and would you like to be involved? That's how I'm here because somebody saw me and said, we are looking for people, would you run the local elections? I was like, what? You know, it's a surprise. But we need to be looking and identifying people who are already making those significant contributions in our community who only need to be encouraged. And like, they're just not being asked quick enough. And then they, and how many times do people need to be convinced then to run as well? And that's

the thing. Erin, I remember interviewing Lucinda Creighton and regardless of what you think of her politics, she was an upfront woman and she certainly stood up for, stood by her convictions. But I remember talking to her about trying to recruit for her new party, as it was, Renewa. And the big thing was she would get, she would approach all these women we're talking about, these fantastic women within the community doing amazing work, like all of you have before you were heard of. I mean, doing extraordinary work. But she found the difference between trying to get a woman in and a man were entirely different. The men just thought, I've had a great crack. Yeah, I'd give it a go. Literally. The women would say, oh no, I don't know. What would I know about six different things?

Time. Time. Yeah, but mainly it was about thinking,

well, if I had to go on a panel, what would I know about education? I'd also have to know about the environment. I'd also have to know about sort of foreign affairs, what's happening in Russia or wherever. What would

I wear? What would I wear? Yeah, I

think there's a statistic somewhere that a man has to be asked once, for every man that is asked once, a woman has to be asked five times or something like that. That's an interesting

statistic for me. Something, yeah.

Women for election or somebody who do fantastic work in that space. But there's no doubt that there is, and I've been there trying to persuade people to run and, you know, they're like, just intimidate it, you I think look at those of us who are then public reps and go, God, you're great, but we couldn't do that. I'm like, no, but you could. But

it's also trying to convince people and it's hard to convince people if they know you and they're looking on and going, God, I wouldn't take that grief, Aaron. You know, I'd rather be working away, doing what I'm doing, doing for my community, staying in the GEA club, making sure that all of that works well, and actually just not taking the grief. Working on the successes and not taking that grief. Well, now, that's what I do understand. And, you know, and be able to go home and just say, well here, I did that today. We had a win, but not take and not have to put yourself so public and always to be so wrong. I found it absolutely fascinating. When I entered politics, I lost friends and gained friends people who never spoke to me before ever in their lives spoke to me because I was a politician people who I grew up with who I went to school with would pass me by because I was a politician so it is absolutely fascinating the psyche of people when they look upon. I became a different person immediately when I put on public rep politician because immediately maybe I was the stereotype, you know, your off for QuickBook or your ego or whatever. I remember a young man called John Lyons

saying that. Do you remember him? He was elected in 2011 on a big wave of Labour victories. And I will never forget his disillusionment. He was a teacher, I think, in Ballymont.

Yes, still teaching. Still teaching. Still cancer.

And sort of really, really, I always felt he was there for the best. He wanted to be a force for good. But I always remember his absolute shock at how that, it was like that era. Yeah, it's fascinating. He was no longer an accessory to community. He was a politician and was there for it. Yeah.

And like anything, we have a job and we have ourselves. And I would say that when people say, oh, Jesus, you have so much confidence and look at you there and you're doing this and you're doing that. No, I'm probably one of the least confident people. But what I do have confidence in, it is confidence in my gut, confidence in what I think about in how I want to, in what I want to do. As regards me at the door, and you were saying there earlier on, Jen, it is mortifying having to go to a door and say, vote for me. But it's like, no, vote for what I can do. Forget about who Aaron is. Vote for what I can do and who I am. But just let me be Aaron. Let me be whoever, you know, the silly, messy child that I was or the teenager I was, just let me be that, let me be a politician. But I'm the same person. It's all one thing as well, but it's such a complicated... You'd need a PhD. Maybe, Jen, you could do another one. I don't know. You've done one. On the opinions and but if you start thinking about all these things you wouldn't leave your house because you become paranoid but you just you leave your house. I remember I do a bit of cross country running well I'm a bit injured at the minute but for Glenmora I see my local Atlanta club and I was there running and finished the race anyway, pretty much towards the end. It's about completing, not winning and competing. But someone goes, Erin, Jesus, I didn't know you. And I've done athletics since I was a child. I was like, God, I didn't think politicians would do that. And I'm like, well, no, Erin does. So it's, you know, I grew up on a farm. I go to a local shop in Wellies and Messy. Still that Erin. And there's still that Erin. But people going, would look twice at you being the Erin that you grew up as because they only see me in the local papers as dressed or in the Dáil dress or in the Senate dress or you're just that. So you, sometimes it's funny because you lose yourself. People lose you from yourself, if you know what I mean, because you're still you. You're still the

person. Well, look, I want to ask you one last thing, which is about your first days in politics in the theatre of the Dáil, as you so well described it, Erin, which was nothing short of a heinous mess. Absolutely. Were you a bit shocked by that, Marie? Well, you're talking about the election

of the Taoiseach, the second day of the Dáil in January. Look, I think that what I was most struck by about this is just how entrenched the positions people can take. that effectively Fianna Fáil and Fianna Gael were prepared to let Michael Lowry decide who should be, you know, designated as opposition or government. And like, and ultimately, all of that could be libertad. And can I just say, to be, you know, I must say... There was a little deal

beforehand, Aaron. But just

to say, like, I looked up at the gallery, right, and Micheál Martin's wife was sitting there and beautifully, you know, done for the day. And there was about 60 people from Cork there waiting for the election of the Taoiseach. And, you know, and I laid the blame squarely at the door of the government parties because they let that day play out, you know, and ultimately it could have been averted. Well, obviously I would have had that. Now,

can I just, Jen, can I ask you, it was a fiasco and it looked like a kid's playground. I mean, there are ways of doing

things. Do you think that was the correct way to protest? I kept thinking of the young people who I'd worked with over the last number of years watching this. I don't know how many of them would have been watching it or people from around the country watching it, thinking this is not how we should be conducting our business. And we have to find a way to negotiate these things before they become into the theatre of the Dáil. As you say, Erin, I think it's really important. But I also think that there's what is not conducive to any debate is that we are constantly positioning ourselves. And I would love to have more debate. I would love for it to have more. And that's not how the doll is designed. I know that. But that's maybe we could take a step back and look and see, is there a way of debating things which has more respect, which has more dignity, which has more humanity, that we can genuinely see how we feel ourselves rather than taking all these positions and, you know, positioning ourselves. I think that that day didn't allow for that. I felt it wasn't allowed. It wasn't allowed. But the thing is that, unfortunately what's happened is that people are very angry around the country that they think you're all being paid a lot of money and you can't conduct yourselves with a bit of divorce.

Do you know what I mean? It was absolutely shocking. I sat in the corner over behind, just actually in front of where the Martins were sitting. So I could see all the theatre. I could see it. I saw the groupings and the opposition. To be honest, I thought it was absolutely despicable by the opposition what they did. Yes, you can say there was disruptions and disagreement for what was happening. There was provocation. In provocation. However, there was agreement. There was agreement that this could happen. There was supposed to be a committee and that committee is happening. Do I think that it was a chance in your arm that Lowry wanted to be in opposition? Absolutely I do. I'm not, I'm going to sit here. Do I think the opposition behave themselves in any way that was fitting to a parliament? Absolutely not. It was chaotic. It was disgraceful, in my opinion. I rang my mother on the way up the car that morning. I was like, ma'am, I am electing a Taoiseach today. Your girl is electing a Taoiseach. And she was like, Erin, I've been watching this all my life, listening to it on the radio or watching television. I can't believe my baby's doing that. And that was the democracy, boo-hoo for me, but that's the importance of the day. And it was disrupted, it was stopped, there was a process that was agreed to, and there is no need for shouting. We'll give Marie the last word on this, and then we're... Just to

be very clear, right, okay, the Labour Party and certainly the other opposition parties are very clear. There was no process. There was a sham of an arrangement whereby Michael Lowry was going to be allowed to be both government. His group were going to be allowed to be government and opposition. And if the opposition did not object that day, the government would have railroaded that through. Now, a crucial part in all this is I became deeply uncomfortable with all the shouting, right? Because I don't believe that that's how we should be conducting ourselves. It's interesting, all three of you agree on this. And that's why, that is why that we actually started, commenced to walk out, right? Because I was like, you know, we have to be able to record our protest here. But actually what had happened was the Kjongkwala. So there's a picture of three of us looking on at the Kjongkwala as she's actually adjourning the Dáil to the following morning. And I was like, it shouldn't have come to that, that people were having to record such protests. But the reality is that the government parties were trying to railroad through a situation that actually, you know, I was shocked the amount of attention that the public actually gave to this because initially I thought this is inside bubble stuff, you know, that No

Marie, it looked like something from Eastern Europe or something where they have fist fights. But the reason,

right, like I was struck, right in my butchers or right across my community, people are saying it's crazy that you would have people who've signed up to a programme for government now wanting to be in opposition. So this is the talk of the town, the talk of the country. The

principle was very obvious, Marie. It was the shouting. It was the behaviour in the chamber, I think, that outsiders like me took

exception to.