In six years’ time, it will be the 100th anniversary of women over 30 years of age being granted the right to vote in Britain. It was not until 1928 that all women were granted the right to participate and vote for the men who governed their lives, their communities and their country.
Fast forward to the present day and it seems inconceivable that women would have such limited and restricted choices today. However the evidence is compelling. In three mayoral elections in key conurbations, there are just four women candidates. In Liverpool, there are no female candidates, so the choice is to vote from the menu of male candidates. In Salford, out of the three main political parties, the Conservatives are the only party who are fielding a female candidate.
The changes to the local democratic process from an elected council leader to an elected mayoral system herald a significant political and social change. To have a 14 per cent drop in female representation from May 2011 to May 2012 shows a serious reversal of political gender equality. This is the lowest percentage of female candidates in elected mayoral elections and it is a significant backward step. Unfortunately this trend is not limited to mayoral candidates and seems to be reflected in the number of women parliamentarians and candidates. Since 1997, there has only been a four per cent increase in female MPs.
In 1997, Labour surged into power with 101 female MPs elected into parliament, a record the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats could only hope to rival in their wildest dreams. The closest either parties has got to Labour’s record are the 49 female MPs elected for the Conservative party in 2010. Granted for Labour in 1997, this was on the back of half of all the winnable seats having to shortlist all-women candidates. With 101 female MP’s elected, nobody could argue that it didn’t work.
However, changes and challenges to this policy resulted in the passing of the Sex Discrimination Act (Election Candidates) 2002, which gave political parties the option of using positive discrimination to redress inequality. The resulting steady decline in female MPs across the political parties is a clear demonstration of what happens when equality polices are diluted and left solely to the diktats of cultural and societal norms.
At the current rate of progress, it could take up to 70 years or 14 elections to have an equal number of female MPs. Yet despite this decline in female MPs, there seems to be a lack of political will to support, train and champion strong capable women candidates to excel and participate in regional and national decision-making processes. In Manchester, the birthplace of the suffragette movement and the very place where the conviction for equality for all, was so powerfully fought for, it seems the lessons from history are still to be learnt. In a city that has had no female Labour MP and just one female parliamentarian in its history, there is an eerie silence on the historical opportunity to elect the first female Labour MP for Manchester. The urgency, passion and commitment to make a historical decision which would not only be a symbolical gesture that reflected Manchester’s radical history but also a powerful reminder to political opponents that the Labour party is the only true home of equality and opportunity for all, is well … it is just not present. Very few local voices have publicly advocated a virtual century-long deadlock of mostly male political rule to be challenged and turned on its head.
In a society where women make up over 46 per cent of the economically active workforce, half of all university graduates, are representative of 51 per cent of the population and contribute to every strand of society, this is frankly an astonishing position. With a very strong short-list, with two strong female candidates, one can only speculate how this peculiar turn of events has taken shape.
There are no miraculous answers to the road towards an equal society, where discrimination according to gender, race, class, disability, sexuality and socioeconomic status are remnants of the past. What is clear is that equality policies, coupled with leadership, courage to fight injustice in actions as well as words and commitment to demonstrate leadership and stand for clear values goes a long way to redressing the equalities gap. Historic campaigns by Labour such as the minimum wage, family tax credits, sure start, and civil partnerships were hard fought for and implemented because individual members fought for and believe the Labour party is the party of equality, fairness and opportunity for all. Let’s hope we do not shirk that responsibility in the light of a seemingly trivial matter of electing the first Labour woman member of parliament for Manchester.
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Update
On 16 April 2012, Lucy Powell was selected as the PPC for Manchester Central in the first ballot by the enlightened members of the constituency. This heralds a historic sea-change in a city where no female Labour MP has ever been selected or elected. Lucy will become the first woman Labour MP to serve Manchester residents if she wins the by-election in November. She will also forever be in the history books, for walking in the footsteps of the brave women who fought for her to continue their journey.
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Amina Lone is Councillor for Hulme ward, Manchester City Council
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“ooohhh look Doris, ‘ tories ‘ ‘lords’ and ‘revolting’ all in one sentence ” ! “ooohh Mabel,I could knit a jumper
with that,pass it over ” !
Couldn’t agree more about the disgrace which is the continuing failure to achieve more women in Parliament and elsewhere.
I am however rather fed up with the notion that the first step is to ‘train’ more women. There are many very politically and professionally senior women who require support to become serious candidates; but they really do not require ‘training’.
Women tend to come into politics as an occupation later in life than men (usual reasons… babies etc; though this doesn’t always apply). In fact, I’d say greater pre-politics experience is often to the advantage of proper functioning of the political process . Life experience is a very good preparation for politics, and entering the political frontline too early is not necessarily the best way, from any persepctive, to do things.
HOWEVER, there is a real problem about how ‘older’ women are perceived in the Party. And the ‘training’ offer (who conducts it?) is simply not appropriate for many of them; they know all about that stuff anyway, often having done the backroom political support for years.
What’s needed is a better respect for the experience and competence of women, when they reach the stage in life when more of them can become seriously frontline politically active. Then more of them might also be willing to put themselves forward.
AGE-RELATED SEXISM is a real obstacle to progress in getting more women to the political frontline, and it’s well time that the Labour party began to realise that and act upon it. For my money, there’s more training required of those who make the running within the Party (officers, officials), before we get too het up about (appropriate) training for women who are potential candidates.
More SUPPORT for female potential candidates, certainly. But it’s the (often youngish, male) Party functionaries and influencers who need the TRAINING?
Just, as they say, a thought….
Hi Hilary, good to read your comments and I agree with some of the points you have made. There are some brilliant women who have all the skills one needs to go to the top in politics. They should receive support and recognition for all they have to offer. I also agree about timing and many women tending to have other commitments before they can fully engage in a political career. I completely agree with your point about the benefits of having ‘life experience’ outside politics. Personally I think having this ‘life experience’ makes one a more rounded, easier to relate to and a much more in touch politician.
As far as training goes, I do not think it should be an either/or situation. We need to offer support in a range of ways and training is just one part of this. I believe training should be part of a robust support package. I fully support utilising the skills that many of the women you mention have and bringing them into training sessions.
I devise and deliver training and one of the best tools in training is to work with a strength-based model so people are empowered to participate fully. Capitalising on expertise within the female politicians’ pool, older or younger, should definitely be part of the support package. Wisdom could be shared across the generations, for example, younger members learning about longevity in politics, older members learning about the latest cutting-edge social media techniques.
The ‘one size fits all’ is not the answer and I think we should be innovative in supporting each other to excel as well as using some of the more tired and tested methods.
For the record I believe men are part of the solution as there are many forward-thinking men ( I am fortunate to have experiences of working with such men) who do not want to maintain the status quo. They want to ensure equality within the Labour party means what it says on the tin too.
Thanks for the thoughtful response Amina. As an adult educator with 30+ years professional experience I of course agree with your specific qualifiers to my general position. No one approach will solve all the issues; but I do have to say I’m seeing far too little progress towards genuine gender equity, and still far too many stereotypical assumptions by various (certainly not all) party influencers about some, especially older, groups of women.
I – a very active LP member since the early 1970s! – have over the years, and even recently, experienced some examples of truly unacceptable behaviour by men in the Party (as I am quite sure would also, perhaps even more, be true if I were in any other political party). It’s clear to me that more enlightened men present / aware of events, who feel uncomfortable about such behaviour, simply don’t believe they are empowered to intervene. And those behaving badly likewise don’t acknowledge (know?) that their actions and assumptions are hostile.
Talking with other women, I hear these sorts of complaints in private quite frequently. Nothing much changes here, and it really should.
Similarly, I see very little which suggests an understanding that what some women require to get started on their public political journeys is support (maybe mentoring, maybe not) so they are more sure about going forward. Training (as you say) is great if you have little experience, but it’s not the same as support and encouragement, if you already have a good backroom grasp.
I couldn’t agree more that ‘one size fits all’ doesn’t address the issues, and that’s what I want to stress.
I’ve been mentoring (and teaching) women and men through positive change and learning all my professional life, and I would like to see a more situation-appropriate approach, proactively, in the LP as well.
Am now in my fourth decade of actively angling and hoping for this – as I willingly acknowledge are many other men and women – and still women have far less influence in front-line politics than men. In fact, I genuinely think as women that in the wider frame we’re going backwards. The ConDems have a great deal already to answer for.
I’d be delighted to collaborate with anyone in the LP who wants to think more broadly about ‘how to get women of all sorts involved’, moving beyond the standard responses. To date, despite genuine efforts, I haven’t had or observed much success here. Let’s hope that’s about the change, and fast.
All the best,
Hilary