Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 17 November 2022
54. Deputy Neale Richmond asked the Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media the measures that her Department is taking to increase female participation in Irish sports at a local and professional level; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [56301/22]
View answerAddressing women’s participation at all levels in sport is an important element of the National Sports Policy.
The Women in Sport funding programme is an important support for sporting bodies in putting programmes in place to increase women’s participation in their sports and to progress their strategic objectives for women in sport. Last year, Sport Ireland announced an investment of €4 million in the Women in Sport Programme for the 2021 - 2022 period. 45 National Governing Bodies (NGBs) are receiving funding under this investment. A further €265,000 was invested last year in the Local Sports Partnerships under the Programme.
Sport Ireland continues to promote women’s participation in sport. For example, recognising the importance that campaigns can play in encouraging and supporting women and girls to be active, the first ever HER Outdoors Week was held in August 2021. Due to the success of the campaign, Sport Ireland ran the event again this August. Over 350 events took place nationwide with over 7,000 females participating across the 7 days. HER Outdoors week aims to celebrate and encourage more females to get out and enjoy the benefits of being in the outdoors while bringing visibility to the opportunities for females to get involved in outdoor physical activity. The campaign targets all females including females with a disability, females from diverse ethnic groups, older females, teenage girls, and females from disadvantaged areas, etc.
As the Deputy will be aware, earlier this year, Minister Martin and I were clear in our support for women’s rugby through engagement with the group of players who sought support in relation to issues they had with the IRFU and particularly the reviews that the IRFU were conducting into the women’s game.
Sport Ireland supported the players in their engagement with the IRFU and remained engaged with all parties up to the launch, in March 2022, of the independent review commissioned by the IRFU into the Women’s Rugby World Cup qualification campaign. This included meetings with all of the parties present and sessions with the players. Sport Ireland remains available to all parties should it be required.
I am pleased to note that the IRFU's new full-time high performance programme for women commenced in recent weeks. This is a very welcome and significant development for women's rugby in Ireland. I acknowledge that this is the first step in the professionalisation of women’s rugby in Ireland and I am keen to see supports for players progress further in the years ahead.
I strongly believe that Government can play a key role in accelerating the closing of the opportunity gap for women’s participation at all levels of sport. A range of National Governing Bodies of Sport are developing strategies in this regard and I look forward to engaging with them in the coming months.
