Ciara Kelly: I dislike Tom McDonnell’s ‘breeding’ talk, but he has a point — women need more support to have children

"If society sees it as desirable, then women should be incentivised to have kids." Image: Getty

Ciara Kelly

I have been thinking about Independent Kildare Councillor Tom McDonnell’s comments that Irish women need to “breed” more. “Our women are only breeding 1.5 or 1.6 children. That’s shocking for an Irish woman. We’ve great women and we want them breeding,” said the last councillor to be elected. “The great women of this country were just forced into work because they have to pay their bills,” he claimed.

There is so much to unpick in this I don’t know where to start. First, there’s the use of the word ‘breed’. Women aren’t livestock or vessels, despite them being viewed as such here previously — the Eighth Amendment is evidence of how we were regarded. So it’s very hard not to bristle at the councillor’s crassness in speaking this way; he later said that he regrets using the word, attributing it to his farming background.