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Women in Public Life

I thank my noble friend Lady Gale for securing this debate. I will not go over the statistics or arguments put forward by some of my colleagues. Since 1997, we have had three Labour Governments, with two enlightened Prime Ministers, Prime Minister Blair and Prime Minister Brown, and an enlightened European Commission. Life has changed enormously for women in this country, although perhaps not as much as we would like. I disagree on one point: the quota system. I have been very lucky never to have had to deal with the quota system. I was elected as a local authority councillor by an all-male union, the Post Office union, as it was then, and then I had other appointments. However, that was in the days when there was change. People talk about quotas here and in other countries. There are quotas in countries that have been at war or where women have never stood for the parliament. To persuade those countries to have women standing for parliament, you had to have the quota system. The figures that are often quoted about high numbers of women in parliament following wars are for Afghanistan, Rwanda, other African countries and Northern Ireland. Those countries have quota systems because women there sat outside the peace talks—they are doing it now in Darfur—and they sat there until they were allowed to come to the peace table. Part of the deal with the UN and other countries involved in getting peace in those countries was that women became members of parliament there. Figures are bandied about showing that there are more women in parliament in such countries, as is true, and that is because quotas were put in place to get women in parliament to make sure that peace was brokered and kept. When you have women at the brink of peace, they can stop a lot of what is happening. Women have stopped suicide bombers and women will continue to ensure that we have peace in this world. I feel strongly about quotas. When you have women in power, as we have today, they can make a difference in three areas. By making a difference, we can bring other women into public life. First, there is the economic situation; secondly, there is the political situation; and, thirdly, there is the human rights situation. We can make a positive difference in those areas if we encourage women by example and through education. We must ensure that teachers in teacher training colleges understand that women have the right to attain any position that they want. Wherever they come from, we should ensure that women are told at school and thereafter, ““You have a right””. We have to change the political situation in the political parties. We should be saying to our colleagues in the Labour Party, the Conservative Party, the Liberal Democrats and other parties that they must change their system of how they elect people at every level. In the same way, we should try to become part of every situation to elect or appoint women. Women are bad to women. Looking at the number of women in public life and at public appointments, we see that women do not select women. The same goes for women headhunters. They ring me up about positions and say, ““What about so and so?””. When I ask whom they have on the shortlist, I find that they do not have a woman on it. We should be encouraging headhunters to have women on their shortlists. If they do not know about the women whom we are talking about, we should be saying to them, ““These are the women who should be brought to the table””. Women can also make a change in skills and training. That is why we should be on the skills and training boards and why we should be part of ensuring that women can attain these skills. We need women in engineering and in science, which have the lowest numbers of women training. Women have a right to be there. If you invest in women, you invest in the rest of the world. The best thing that you can do with such money is to invest in women; they are the best workforce. In countries that invest in women, such as our country, the GDP goes up. When women in the workforce enjoy where they are working, they stay there and you do not have constant change. Working women can educate their sons to respect women and to be on equal terms.