A Limerick councillor is facing criticism for labelling female candidates from establishment parties in her area ‘handmaidens’.

In the wake of the General Election, Social Democrats Councillor Elisa O’Donovan responded to a post on X pointing out that no women had been elected to the Dáil in Limerick City.

Cllr O’Donovan replied: "The women from the establishment parties got the men elected so they did their job well #handmaidens.”

Cllr O’Donovan has stood by this claim and has also since said that she was subjected to a ‘witch hunt’ and ‘embarrassingly poor journalism’ when asked to comment further.

On Newstalk Breakfast, Fianna Fáil TD Erin McGreehan said that these remarks were ‘unnecessarily nasty’.

“I know elections are hard fought, they’re even harder won, but to bandy around insults onto other women also on the ticket – why? What are you going to gain,” she said.

“It’s just, as I said, unnecessarily nasty – and [she] now calls it a witch hunt when asked about those insulting comments.

“You’re a woman in public life, a person in public life – to insult someone and then call it a witch hunt when you’re asked about those insults, I think that’s also quite silly."

Tokenism

Deputy McGreehan rejected the idea that there was an element of ‘tokenism’ in adding women to the ticket who had very little chance of being elected.

“We have had 100 years of token youngfellas being added to tickets to be sweepers – this is how tickets are made,” she said.

“There are incumbents who have a bigger platform, who are known more, who have done more work in the constituency by the very virtue that they’ve been there."

Deputy McGreehan said that the women who had run in Limerick City ‘don’t need to be insulted like this’.

'Disappointing'

Cllr O’Donovan told the Irish Independent in response to her comments that Ireland had the worst gender representation in Western Europe, with the lowest proportion of female representation compared to other Western European countries.

Deputy McGreehan said this is ‘disappointing’, but still does not excuse Cllr O’Donovan’s comments.

“So many women around the country, my female colleagues in Fianna Fáil, were within a small number of votes of actually getting elected,” she said.

“Let’s be real, people need to start voting for women – and even on my campaign it was said to me in the doors, ‘I will not vote for women’.

“That’s not a party decision, that’s a social attitude – and when people have said that to me, to my face, imagine what they’re saying behind my back.”

Deputy McGreehan said that more kindness and less ‘bullets and guns’ were needed in politics.

Listen back here: