A recent study has called on the Dáil to allow reserved seats for Traveller women in order to tackle the problem with exclusion.
A report submitted by the 'Beyond Gender Quotas: Addressing the Political Exclusion of Traveller Women in Ireland', which looked at the absence of Traveller women from Irish politics, has warned that this continued underrepresentation in politics will lead to a bigger exclusion from society.
They have called for the creation of "nested quotas" and Special Electoral Districts or reserved seats in order to combat this problem.
This "nested quota" would involve allowing for a sub-quota for Traveller women within the current 40% gender quota when it comes to selecting candidates for the Dáil. As it stands, there is just one Traveller women in the current 1,185 current elected representatives in Ireland.
This report was prepared by Maynooth University researcher, Shane Gough, who said that Ireland have a chance to lead internationally by adopting an "intersectional, evidence-based and legally sound reforms", which would allow for Traveller women to have a voice in democratic decision making.
The report was supported by the Department of Children, Disability and Equality. It has also stated that Traveller women's exclusion from the Irish political landscape is "is neither accidental nor inevitable", while intersectional exclusion is also evident in political recruitment, public discourse, candidate selection as well as media treatment.
It was also found that Traveller women who ran for politics had reported extreme levels of racist and sexist abuse, both in person and online, which led to "a regression in Traveller participation in recent election cycles", according to reports in RTÉ.
In 2024, no Traveller women stood for the local elections, while one Traveller man did, a ration of one candidate for every 33,000 people, compared with one candidate per 5,266 migrants. Only two Traveller women have ever been nominated by political parties to run in Dáil elections in the State's 104 year history.
Certain recommendations included establishing a Traveller and Minorities Sub Panel for the Seanad with a nested gender quota of at least 50%. It also recommends introducing a nested Traveller candidate quota within the existing gender quota for any candidate selection for general elections for the Dáil.
Elsewhere, it also called on increasing constituency magnitudes in future Dáil boundary revisions to allow for Traveller women to have a fair chance of being elected.
A Traveller Special District at national level for the Dáil akin to the one which operates in New Zealand for the Maori population was also recommended.
