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Women in Public Life

I am aware that I am already eating into the Minister’s time, so forgive me if I try to keep my remarks as short as I can. I, too, am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Gale, for raising this important issue today. I am especially pleased to speak, as I have spent 40 years championing the promotion of women. I have never been obsessed by equality of numbers. It is a useful tool but, like the noble Baroness, Lady Kingsmill, I have been motivated by thinking of the wealth of talent that the country is missing out on. As has been said, this year marks the 90th anniversary of some women first being granted suffrage in this country. Like my colleague in another place, the shadow Minister for Women and Equalities, Theresa May, I firmly believe that we must use the anniversary of women’s suffrage as an opportunity to promote further discussion on how to improve the role of women in politics in the UK and internationally. It was not until 1918 that women aged 30 or older were allowed to vote and to stand for Parliament and not until 1928 that women had the vote on the same basis as men. The wheels of change grind slowly indeed and we must maintain our determination to see men and women equally represented in public life. I understand that the UK is ranked 51st equal in the world and 13th in the European Union—not a happy place to be. The picture is only slightly better away from Westminster. The proportion of women in the Scottish Parliament is 33 per cent and the proportion in local government is about 29 per cent. Only in the National Assembly for Wales, as the noble Baroness pointed out, does the proportion of women Members come close to genuine parity—it is just under half. It is worth saying that the Government may wish to start a little closer to home before they begin preaching to public bodies through the equality Bill. It saddens me to say that they have failed to tackle the significant glass ceiling in the Civil Service. Across all departments, women fill only 31 per cent of senior Civil Service positions. In the worst-offending departments, such as the MoD, they fill as few as 13 per cent of senior positions. On top of this, the gender pay gap in government departments is significantly higher than the national average of 17.2 per cent. In the Treasury, the pay gap is a staggering 26 per cent. In the MoD, it is 22 per cent. Clearly this needs to be rectified. The Government need to get their own house in order to be credible. We need not heed the words of those who say that there is no need for positive action to redress the balance when eight out of 10 Members of Parliament are men. We should not listen to those who argue that positive action invalidates the achievement of those who benefit from it. We completely disagree with these arguments. As the Leader of the Opposition, who has done so much to begin to usher in the necessary changes in the Conservative Party, has said, it is about political effectiveness. To create effective policy, we must involve those who are affected by it. We should all take notice of those words as we consider what can be done to increase the participation of women in public life. We must continue in our determination to reach our goal.