Women from all the main parties are set to join forces next week - to demand an increase in females in the next Assembly. Yet only one in six candidates fighting it out for the 108 seats are women - a marginal drop compared to the last Stormont election. Women now represent a slight majority in the province (51%) even before the next census figures are revealed.

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Political parties are going to have to start choosing a lot more female candidates if they want to retain the current €14m a year subsidy from the taxpayer. In what was described by one senior source as "a radical step", the Cabinet has approved a proposal to cut taxpayers' funding for political parties by 50 per cent if they fail to select a sufficient number of female candidates for national elections. The abysmally low level of representation for women in national politics has been an ongoing source of embarrassment for the political system.