In 1989, the Belfast artist Rita Duffy made a pair of paintings called Mother Ireland and Mother Ulster. Mother Ireland represents the kind of criticism David Trimble levelled at Bertie Ahern over the abortion referendum, showing a weary woman nurturing four babies while the top of her head is hot-wired to a nearby cathedral. A Catholic bishop in full Episcopal dress lurks over her right shoulder.
Mother Ulster is an equally miserable specimen, dressed in full aprons, ready to clean and tidy everything round her while an Orange drummer marches in the background. She is literally sinking into the ground: houses nearby are tilting dangerously; the Lagan waters are rising to drown her neat little family. She embodies Ahern's critique of Trimble; like her sister, she badly needs a makeover.
Indications are that neither Ahern nor Trimble is about to give her one. Performance indicators of sectarianism show the fallout "up there" is far worse than "down here". Yet shift the language from sectarianism to sexism and neither man shows evidence of knowing how to use his political muscle, whatever its size. Performance-wise, they fail miserably on most scores related to women and so-called women's issues.
That is their true meeting of minds. Only 15 women hold seats in the 108-member Assembly, and although it operates more family-friendly work hours than the Dáil, so few measures are in place to encourage women into politics that this huge democratic deficit is likely to continue.
The Dáil exudes the scent of middle-aged testosterone in even greater doses than the Assembly. Only 21 women are TDs out of 166 in total, and most carry a double burden because of it. They realise that they won't get on in politics if they focus on so-called women's issues, such as childcare provision, but they're often put under greater pressure from women's organisations simply because they are women. In other words, even the women's organisations are being either sexist or downright naïve, because they can lay higher expectations on women deputies, regardless of their political weight.
AHERN retorting to Trimble that his party isn't so hot on abortion either is closer to the mark. During Trimble's stewardship, family planning clinics in Belfast were burned or intimidated out of existence by extreme anti-abortion groups - not for performing abortions but for offering simple reproductive health services, such as smear tests, breast checks and the morning-after pill. The RUC did not stop them.
Trimble criticising Ahern on abortion forgets the mote in his own eye. Women in Northern Ireland are actually denied the same reproductive healthcare services as women in the rest of Britain. When the matter was discussed by the Assembly in June 2000, men who wouldn't otherwise give each other the time of day stood shoulder to shoulder in refusing to even countenance the thought that "their women" were entitled to the same citizenship as the ladies the Right Hon Mr Trimble meets at Buckingham Palace garden parties.
The boys have more in common than they thought. Where would David Trimble's credibility be without the graceful eloquence of Lady Sylvia Harmon? Where would Bertie Ahern be without sending an unhappy looking Mary O'Rourke in to bat for him when the abortion referendum got too close to the bone? And where will future women in politics get to if they and they alone are supposed to promote issues such as childcare? As things stand, men in politics have more children on average than women in politics do, and because women are too minor a force to insist that the Dáil adapts its procedures to make life easier for women - beg pardon, that should read parents - we can expect male politicians' fertility to remain higher than their female peers.
This debate should have finished at least 10 years ago. Or five years ago, when Ahern promised as an election commitment to enforce gender balance on all his boards and committees. There's one promise he certainly didn't keep, unlike his late, unlamented referendum.
In fact, over 75 per cent of overseas women having abortions in Britain come from the island of Ireland, despite Britain being, as Trimble himself said, a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural place. Has either raised their female citizens' healthcare needs with Tony Blair, spoken with him about their concerns about late terminations or post-abortion check-ups? Thought not.
THE persistent pattern of so-called pro-life No votes in that referendum marks areas not where the Dana factor is high, but where women are so badly under-represented on everything from local authorities to health boards and traffic advisory groups that knowing the figures would ruin your weekend, whatever your stance on sex and gender. Donegal County Council is 86 per cent male; Roscommon and Westmeath are 96 per cent male. A full 100 per cent membership of Urban District Councils in Athlone, Athy, Birr, Bundoran, Carlow and Castlebar are male.
Time to take the aprons off. In otherwise conservative Portugal, so Dr Yvonne Galligan of Queen's said recently, the Prime Minister led a campaign to get more women into politics by asking voters to imagine themselves in someone else's shoes. He saucily held up a pair of stilettos. David and Bertie are still struggling with the apron strings.
mruane@irish-times.ie