This article is from page 4 of the 2014-05-27 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 4 JPG
WHEN Clare Colleran Molloy FF and Mary Howard FG were elected to Clare County Council on the 20th and final Ennis count it brought to three the number of women that would serve on the next local authority.
The female complement on the new 28-seat council is still only 10 per cent of the overall council membership, but it is also a 200 per cent increase in female representation at county level.
It was feared that when Cllr Patrica McCarthy (Ind), the only woman on the current council, announced her retirement there would be a shortage of female candidate willing to come forward.
While there will be no female representation on the Killaloe, Shannon and West Clare Municipal Areas, Ennis will now have three.
Clare Colleran Molloy was the last of the three – which includes Ann Norton (Ind) – to be elected and the dark horse among the three.
Her election she admitted was a surprise even to herself.
“I am so thrilled first and foremost as a first time candidate that I got that vote of confidence from so many people and obviously it is reflective of all the hard work I put in along with my husband Tony. We started knocking on doors on February 6 and we had such a good team of not only family and friends but also good cumann Fianna Fáil support,” she said.
“I did not expect to be standing here today,” she said minutes after she was declared elected.
The woman from Quin explained that after hours of nervous energy on Saturday, she had resigned herself to the fact that she would not get the seat by the Sunday. Hours later she was elected.
The new councillor elect has already got a “baptism of fire” in the world of politics following a flow of comments on a public online forum caused her distress ahead of the election.
The barrister said she was currently having that issue dealt with and is looking forward to her new political career.