In terms of the other main parties, women make up 28% of Sinn Fein candidates, 16% of the DUP’s, 14% of SDLP candidates and only 10% of UUP candidates approximately.
Cllr Judith Cochrane said: “I am pleased that Alliance is running the most diverse team of candidates in Northern Ireland and the best balance of candidates in terms of gender out of the five main parties. We think that it is important that those elected to Stormont should be as representative of the whole community as possible and it is very disappointing that many of the other main parties have failed to even come close to our party in terms of providing a gender balance, especially parties like the SDLP, who previously had a much higher proportion of women candidates.
“Alliance has a proven track record of leading change in terms of increasing the number of women elected, with a high number of women Councillors elected across Northern Ireland and, of course, Anna Lo and Naomi Long have shown how successful Alliance women can be.”
“We are very hopeful of electing more women to Stormont this year and we hope that this will help deliver an overall higher proportion of MLAs that are women at the Assembly.”
ENDS