Today is International Women’s Day with a theme to “Inspire Inclusion”.
I am in Brussels hosting a special European Olympic Committee Conference on Gender Equality through Sport being attended by 22 National Olympic Committees from across the continent.
Lochlann Walsh, Chair of the Olympic Federation of Ireland Gender Equality Commission will address the conference as will Sinead Dowling, Irish born and bred and now working with the International Olympic Committee running the Olympic Solidarity Fund.
It will be as morning where we look at the successes of recent years but also at the ongoing challenges faced on the road to true equality.
Events are taking place all across this week. Sarah Keane, CEO of Swim Ireland and President of the Olympic Federation of Ireland and I spent an hour in conversation in front of a packed room at Arthur Cox yesterday and William Fry hosted a discussion last night with Minister for Sport Thomas Byrne, Su Carty of the IRFU and Lindsay Peat.
Away from the talk there have been hundreds of activation events getting girls and women active in taster sessions across the country.
The importance of all these events will be in what they lead to. The follow through as important as the inspiration at the start.
The end game of equality it to make it ordinary, that every boy and girl born in this decade can grow up in a world where it will not be the exception for both Men’s and Women’s football teams to play at the Aviva Stadium, where they will have equal opportunity to play the games of their choice and be valued equally by their peers, by the media and society for doing so.
Change happens in the small improvements that every one of us can make, every day, starting today, and then starting afresh every day.
My undertaking is that at least 40 per cent of the sporting events I attend in 2024 will be men’s events and the same for Women’s events. It will take a bit of planning and sometimes it will bring me to events that were not on my radar but that can only be a good thing.
What will you pledge on this International Women’s Day?
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