List of female members of the Parliament of Northern Ireland

Women had played an important role in Ulster unionist resistance to Irish Home rule, but after achieving Northern Ireland's continued place in the United Kingdom, the new province was predominantly governed by men.

Women had played a crucial part in the struggle for independence, but the politics of the new Irish Free State were male-dominated.

[16] The nine women included two Roman Catholics: the Liberal Sheelagh Murnaghan[7] and the independent Eileen M. Hickey,[17] both elected by Queen's.

Prime Minister James Craig was explicit about the main purpose of abolishing STV: to prevent the emergence of non-sectarian class politics, and force voters to make a binary choice between supporters and opponents of the union with Great Britain.

[18] This was largely successful: the Northern Ireland Labour Party (NILP), which had won three seats in 1925, never made a breakthrough.

In the first Parliament, unionist Julia McMordie (1921–1925) was notable for her support of women officers in the Royal Ulster Constabulary.

In the 1960s, McNabb was a strident opponent of the development in her constituency of the new town of Craigavon, and of the compensation rates for farmers whose land was compulsorily purchased.

[22] The Liberal Sheelagh Murnaghan's time in Stormont was notable for her introduction in 1964 of a Human Rights Bill which would have outlawed discrimination on grounds of religion or gender, and established a commission to enforce the ban.

[26] Parker stood down at the 1929 general election, when her son-in-law James Lenox-Conyngham Chichester-Clark won a seat, and went to live in England with her new husband.