Yes Minister!

When Nuala Fennell became Ireland’s First Minister of State for Women’s Affairs, it could only be seen as a major step forward. In relation to women’s issues, this country lagged hopelessly behind the rest of Europe. There were so many obvious areas of discrimination that she could act on – progress would be immediate and tangiable, or so it seemed. That kind of optimism was fuelled by the fact that Nuala Fennell herself had been involved in the Women’s Movement through the sixties and the early seventies. She was a feminist with a track record of practical work, and achievement. She would know the score.

But things are seldom as they seem. The radical changes didn’t happen overnight and in some respects – most specifically with the passing of the abortion amendment – the coalition government of which Nuala Fennell was a part, seemed to participate in setting the cause of feminism back years.

Against that backround of some disillusionment, however, progress has been made. From the establishment of a battered wives home under the auspices of the Eastern Health Board and a number of sexual assault treatment units at the Rotunda Hospital, through a further grant aiding the Rape Crisis Centre, to pushing through a number of amendments to the Employment Equality Act – and finally last week releasing the draft of the Status of Children Bill, designed to eliminate discrimination against children born outside marriage – practical measures have been dilligently worked on, and in many cases put into effect. While numerous feminists remain critical, the achievements are undeniable...

And beyond that? The purpose of this interview was not just to look at the hopes and aspirations of the Minister of State for Women’s Affairs, but also to discover what makes Nuala Fennell tick. And hopefully to give an insight to men, as well as women (who in most cases may know much better), just how far down the road we’ve still got to go.
Together?

You are, more or less, constantly working with men in the Fine Gael Party. Have you found that a difficult experience compared to your work in the Women’s Movement?
Yes, of course, it was the first time that I worked with – and I suppose most other women politicians worked with – men. I think the first parliamentary party meeting we went to in 1981, when a number of young women were elected to Fine Gael, there were a lot of sniggers and laughs and kind of, it was funny that all these women were standing up, because we had rollcall and all the new TDs (you know there were a lot of new TDs in Fine Gael and we all had to stand up and say who we were and they ticked us off) there was a general kind of funny-stroke-jocose approach to it. But that’s gone.

Were you insulted at all?
No. No. Occasionally you had groups of men, not necessarily only TDs or elected politicians, who would make sexist jokes – and I don’t mean dirty jokes, I mean sexist jokes – and I find them offensive and I fine it very difficult to cope with that because reacting can contribute, in a way, to the sense of enjoyment the men will get from telling it. It’s a difficult position to be in and I don’t thnk any man can understand it. There is not a lot of it but there is some of it in the Dáil.

What about the feeling though that there is always too much compromising in attempts to reform legislation in Ireland?
The objective of the illegitimacy legislation is in the intrests of the welfare of the child. It's not about giving this man or woman rights and it's not about conflict they might have had with each other – it’s about the children who are born and it’s their intrest and their welfare, and the Bill as produced has been welcomed by CHERISH, by the Federation of Service for Unmarried Parents and they are the people that I feel know most about this. They are very pleased with the legislation. Therefore I don’t think it’s correct (I’m into facts) it’s not factual to say that it is a compromise, it’s not a compromise. It’s the most radical legislation, much more radical than you have in Britain.

Are you completely happy with the legislation on contraception?
Yes.

And are you happy with the age restriction?
Yes I am, I think it was a good compromise. Some people felt it should have been younger, some people felt it should have been older, I think 18 is probably a very good agreed compromise. It’s the age of majority. And I think it recognises the very real fears of parents who feel that contraceptive shouldn’t be available to young children – as somebody who has young children, under 18 years myself, I can appreciate that.”

What about the feeling that teenagers are going to become involved in sex in one way or another?
I would think that that would be undesirable... I don’t think it is necessary, it's somethng that should be absolutely discouraged, I don’t think that young people can handle or cope with the emotional or physiological aspects of sexual activity at 16, 17 or 15. I know the reality is that some of them are and I think it is very unfortunate.

On the other hand you won’t escape the reality that they will – and probably in an increasing way – become involved in sexual activity earlier?
People will go out and drive cars on the road when they are drunk and they shouldn’t do that either. You can’t legislate for all behaviour – you can just set a target that is ideal and hope that people for the best reasons will respect those targets, particularly the law.

Do you see sexual activity intrinsically as a healthy activity?
Yes.

So why shouldn’t a 16-year-old feel that it’s as healthy for them?
I’m not making decisions for everybody, I’m just giving you my opinion.

But I’m just thinking from the point of view of people who are 16 and who feel strongly that it should be a right at that age and they are specifically denied the mechanisms where they can take preventive/protective measures to avoid having children.
Well, I can’t, nobody can, legislate for every occasion. As legislators we have to look at the social situation and consider the needs of the people and opt for the best possible targets.

You have been attacked for lack of achievement in office by some of your former collegues in the Women’s Movement.
I think it was very understandable because you’re talking of the kind of women who were in Women’s Lib and they had very little idea of what politics was about. They hadn’t been in parties, they hadn’t studied the parliamentary process and they had high expectations, without understanding the reality of political life. I understand their frustrations and I suppose I feel that perhaps they could have shown a bit more understanding and examined the new frame-work within which women politicians were working. I think maybe they understand a bit more now.

At the same time,there is a degree of impatience with the slowness of the process of legislative change.
That’s only if you don’t understand the nature of how laws are made.You don’t make or formulate legislation in weeks or months. You do it actually in years and that’s not just in Ireland, that’s in America, France, England and everywhere else. I had to discover that when I went in, I now know it, I appreciate it and now 2 ½ years into my office I have, as you know, this week produced the Bill on illegitimacy, which is a very complex piece of legislation. I have a report, again on women, being published within 2 weeks that took 18 months to do. Again when people see how comprehensive it is they will understand why it took so long.

Was there a lot of interest in sex when you were in school yourself?
How do you mean interested in sex...? No, quite frankly there wasn’t, I was a girl a long time ago, I am 49 now, and I went to a convent school, we were very innocent and had a very simple pleasures.

Until what age – what was the time when people actually really began to be interested in sex?
I think I started going out with my husband, my present husband (laughs), when I was 17 – when you say “interested in sex”, I presume you’re asking were people sleeping together?

Yes.
No, I don’t think there was the same pattern as you would have now. You certainly didn’t have the same freedom or access as there is at the present time.”

Do you regret not having had that wide range of expeience?
No.

Not at all?
No.

What age were you when you got married?
22, I have been married 26 years.

A lot of people would say that was quite young.
I don’t think so, we were pretty typical, I think, of that generation.

Did you live together before you got married?
No.

So would you approve now if at the age of 20/21 a daughter decided to live with somebody?
I brought my children up with what I would consider good standards of morals and behaviour and I wouldn’t dictate to them – it’s kind of up to them to make up their own minds. I feel that they have had the kind of up-bringing which would give me confidence that they would make the decision that was right for them.

That doesn’t answer the question in fact.
I think it does.

No – it doesn’t at all.
What are you asking? Do I approve or disapprove of my kids?

No, I mean you say the decision is their’s – obviously it's their’s in one sense because that’s in the nature of things. But would you yourself feel relaxed about a situation where your daughter decided to live with somebody else...?
I honestly, sincerely say I wouldn’t interfere – I mean that aspect of my daughter or my son’s life wouldn’t be one that would – you know I think it is an interesting discussion that we are having, I don’t think probably that too many irish people would have it. It wouldn’t be something for me to make a discussion or feel anything about.

Well that’s not a traditional attitude because...
Well I’m not a traditional woman.

I’m not disputing that, but there is a very strong disapproval of sex outside marriage in Ireland and I just don’t think there are many parents who would feel shy about expressing precisely that to their children.
I’m not one of them.

So does that amount to a tacit acceptance of somebody living in that kind of lifestyle?
It indicates that I have a belief and a trust in my children and I know them very well.

Do you think the concept of Feminism has lost a lot of meaning for younger women?
I think that younger women like my daughter – I have a beautiful twenty-three year old daughter, I don’t know if you know her – I think she just accepts as a matter of form that she can do anything she wants to do. You know feminism isn’t important to her at the moment because things have worked out for her, she hasn’t had discrimination, she has grown up in a world where you don’t have the marriage bar in work, she had had equal opportunity of education – all the things that were there when I was growning up didn’t exist for her, so therefore she is probably not aware of her feminism, but she is a feminist. She just doesn’t flaunt it in the way perhaps that I and my contemporaries did because it was necessary to make a statement. Young people today don’t find that necessary.

We did a vox-pop based around a series of demands which the Women’s Centre put together for this issue. A significant number of women prefaced what they were saying with "I’m not a feminist, but..." or "I’m not a womens libber but..." and that seems to be a very prevalent kind of attitude.
I think maybe some young women feel – and young men too I think – that you't can be feminist without looking quite unfeminine. Women like to have their hair nice and there is almost an implication that if you’re feminist you have to look a mess, you know. I think that a lot of young women now just want to distance themselves from that. To me it doesn’t matter, I don’t really care what people look like.

Is there a loss of momentum in relating to womens issues?
The laws have changed, the structures are open, the gates – wherever you want to look ,in work, in education, politics – are open for women. It’s up to women themselves now, I think what’s important is that the impetus is kept up, that the attitudes keep changing – the attitudes of all our institutions whether it's politics or the church or the professions – that their attitude and approach to women is forced to go on changing.

And do you find the Joanne Hayes case frightening?
Joanne Hayes? I prefer not to comment on that – there’s, as you know, a Public Inquiry and it wouldn’t be appropriate for me to comment on the details of it. Certainly some women have expressed their concern to me about it, but I want to wait until that’s over before I comment.

There have been a number of incidents recently which seemed to underline the fact that whatever the progress might seem to be, that women are still fighting a losing battle. The Eileen Flynn case suggested that in a very concrete way.
I think that Irish women aren’t running away anymore, they are staying, they are challenging Irish Society with things. They would have shifted away to England, or somewhere else in the past – and that’s what we are seeing. They are challenging the community in which they live and they are challenging the institutions of the State, in most of the cases that you are talking about.

Is the fact that the Church is so rigidly male dominated not a major barrier to women in Ireland?
I think perhaps, there is some difficulty in so far as the Church is (I’m not just saying one Church) the Churches are not listening to what’s happening. All these women are changing, all these women’s lifestyles. For instance, the young women who’s expectations of her life is a career and a husband and children, the women whose marriage has gone very badly wrong; the women who want to aspire to the positions such as mine or higher – there have been very fundamental changes in what women tolerate and expect. I don’t believe the Churches have responded or are open to listen to that. I’ve spoken to a number of Bishops because I am aware of this, I’m Catholic and I see that the Church doesn’t appear to be sympathetic to what I feel and to what I’m thinking. I’ve spoken to Bishop Cassidy, I’ve spoken to Bishop Noonan and I’ve spoken with Bishop Kavanagh – had very interesting conversations with them, but not since I was a politician.

Why not since you were a politician?
I think I spoke to Bishop Cassidy when I was a politician – they are a little bit afraid, and they shouldn’t be. They should see that there are areas, you know, of mutual benefit to talk to people like me.

Do you not find a basic contradiction, for a woman being a Catholic when the Church so absolutely and utterly excludes women from positions of real power?
No. I think you have to – in any institution – I mean this is my philosophy about politics, that you tend to change from within – there is no point in trying to change anything from the outside. I think if you try to change from within then you’re achieving something positive. And I care enough about being a Christian to want to change and want to change it for women and feminist thinking. I’m not getting very far in Ireland though.

What is the situation on Divorce legislation?
I think that inevitably there will be legislation when we are going to be ready to have a referendum, to enable the people to say. I think the poll last week is interesting in that 52% of the people say that they would vote to take the prohibition out of the Constitution. That’s a very big move forward. Therefore, I think peoples’ attitudes are changing very quickly and we want to wait until we are fairly certain that we are going to win the poll. I would consider it very irresponsible if any government went to the country on divorce issue without being fairly certain that it would be won.

At the same time people are suffering terrible indignities and living in particularly anomalous situations while there isn’t any action.
It’s up to the people, people have a say in this one – not the Government. It's a decision of the people, it’s a Constitutional Referendum issue.

But to an extent is that not also a leadership question. That Politicians should be able to take the lead and motivate...
Try and help people to understand why you give a lead... Yes I think so, and both parties in Government are doing that. I think it is Mr.Haughey and F.F. that seem to be playing Tiddlywinks with it.”

What is your attitude towards someone like Boy George and his trans-sexual...?
I think he’s smashing!

Are you worried about the moral implications of pop music?
No, why would I be?

Because its often contrary to Catholic teaching in its moral implications...
Not at all – that’s nonsense.

What about Boy George songs which can be interpreted as celebrating homosexuality?
It’s his expression, it’s his statement – if people enjoy it... you know he is not putting them against the wall shooting them, he isn’t compelling anybody to join anything.

There was a fear that his dressing up might have an “unhealthy” effect on a generation between, say, 11 and 16 – that role definitions would become terribly confused?
I think it’s funny. It takes a fair degree of self confidence to put on a performance, make up, eye shadow, hats and all that and go out there and do what he wants to do anyway. And I’m all for people having a choice in doing what they feel they want to do, as long as they are not doing any harm to anybody else.

How would you feel if your son told you that he was gay?
I’d probably be sorry. I’d feel sorry for him because I don’t think that it would be the most ideal way forward in his life. I wouldn’t be critical or condemn it or anything like that. I would attempt to help him. Anything my kids would tell me – and I would hope they would tell me everything – I would understand them and try to help them. I feel I have a very good relationship with my kids.

What do you think of the fate of Garrets Crusade?
I consider it's still there, it's more low-key, I think he is still committed to it.

It has created a considerable level of cynicism in that he came out with very strong statements of intent and then he seemed to back track on it all.
Well, of course, the Ammendment Debate and the Abortion Referendum was a terrible setback for everyone, for all of us and the bitterness of the debate, the acrimony, the division. I think it's healing, I think we’re learning to cope now, but it was awful and it is an awful setback.

Presumably you’ve known people who have had abortions?
I don’t know Irishwomen, I know women who were French and American, not Irish women – but I think, I mean some women I know have had abortions because women told me about them and it’s clear by the statistics there has to be.

Is it your view that women are in any way diminished as a result of that?
Not at all.

What would your attitude towards abortion be?
I have always had a very clear view on abortion – my feminist collegues would like to see it otherwise. When abortion is talked about, I have always said we are talking about the third party. I mean if we are talking about the man and the woman we are talking about a foetus and I could never come to grips with abortion and I don’t think I ever will. I can always see it as not taking into account the third party, which is the foetus. So that’s my view always.

Where somebody had made a series of free choices and there is a certain outcome, that’s one equation. But on the other hand if somebody is raped and they do conceive. What then?
It’s possible to have a morning after pill now, we do know that. If somebody is raped they can be sure they do not get pregnant. But I cannot, you know, give you anything more than I have given you and that’s my honest opinion. Probably before I had chiildren I would have glibly said “oh well, so what?” but I have been pregnant three times and I have felt movement from a very early time, and knowing there that there was human life there – that’s influenced me.

Did you use contraception yourself?
All kinds, natural methods which were desperate – dreadful things to try to cope with – rhythm methods. But during our marriage, yes, we used contraceptives.

What would you say is the most memorable experience inyour life?
(pause) The birth of my first child. She was born on Christmas Day. That was the most profound and incredible experience of my life – everything else was secondary after that. That’s one thing I feel sorry for men about. You know, if we talk about the advantages of being a woman – one of the advantages of being a woman is that you can be a mother. You can actually give life and no man can ever experience that, and I think in my lifetime I have only met two men who said, that’s the one thing they envied in women. Sometimes I wonder about them, do they ever feel left out.

Do you remember the first time you slept with somebody?
I’m not going to tell you (laughs).

Was it particularly memorable?
Oh, very memorable.

Do you think Irish attitudes to the physical aspects of sex are under-developed?
I don’t know – I think most Irish people naturally like sex. I mean it’s a very enjoyable occupation or preoccupation. I think its not that I’m evading your question, but I get bored with people constantly talking about sex. I think it’s a very natural, normal occupation.

The results can be very sophisticated –
You mean sexual intercourse? Is that what you’re talking about?

Yes, but there are a thousand variations on sexual stimulation and pleasure.
Well fair enough, whatever your choice is.

I have an impression that Irish attitudes are still...
I don’t know. I don’t tend to talk to people about their sexual behaviour or their sexual deviations. I presume, and I think, it’s a very private thing between two people. Do you find people talk at length and discuss it? Am I missing something?”

Well its certainly more talked about now than it would have been 20 years ago.
Yes, well I haven’t found that, I mean nobody discusses their sexual intrests with me, and I don’t ask them.

Surely it was an intrinsic part of what the women's movement achieved to make people more willing to talk about sex and obviously women became very much more aware of their psyciology and sexuality.
Well, I think that one of the effcts of the womens movement was to make women less discerning, to make some women feel that they had to – that it was expected of them – to have sex, not to distinguish. You have sex because you want it and it’s the right thing for you, not because it’s the trend and somebody says you are going to be a square if you don’t.

I remember you being reasonably enthusiastic about Fear of Flying, by Erica Long?
Oh, yes yes; the Zipless Fuck.

That was basically about the search for the ultimate erotic experience.
Yes, well I think women discovered a lot of things. They’ve discovered they could have multiple orgasms, they can have a more enjoyable sex life then men can. But I mean essentially it's more important that women be allowed freedom of choice. That it should be their decision and they shouldn’t feel compelled, because of trends or notions – or what anybody else says – to have sexual relations. I would feel that would be one of the more negative effects of the Women's Movement.

Interview first published in Hot Press Volume 9, Issue 9, May 1985.