![]() House of Commons |
Session 2008 - 09 Publications on the internet General Committee Debates Equality Bill |
Equality Bill |
The Committee consisted of the following Members:Alan Sandall, Eliot Wilson,
Committee Clerks attended
the Committee Public Bill CommitteeThursday 25 June 2009(Morning)(Mr. Joe Benton in the Chair)Equality BillWritten evidence to be reported to the HouseE54
Public Interest Research Unit (additional
memorandum) E55
Fitness Industry
Association E56
Business in the
Community
Clause 99Selection
of
candidates 9
am Lynne
Featherstone (Hornsey and Wood Green) (LD): I beg to move
amendment 203, in clause 99, page 73,
line 22, at end
insert (f) internal party
elections.. The
amendment allows political parties to positively discriminate in their
own internal elections, such as elections for executive members on
local
councils.
The
Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss the
following: amendment 204, in clause 101, page 74,
line 3, at end
insert (2A) An association
is deemed to have at least 25 members for the purposes of subsection
(1)(a) if it has been reconstituted or formed out of an association of
at least 25
members.. An
amendment to prevent an association from reconstituting itself into
many separate associations as a means of avoiding the duties under the
Act. Amendment
205, in
clause 101, page 74, line 4, leave
out subsection (3). The
amendment prevents the Government from reducing or increasing the
number of members an association must have to be covered by this
Act.
We agree with
the Government that enabling political parties to discriminate
positively in elections is a good thing, because that changes
representation, and, as we know, there has been woeful
under-representation of women and ethnic minorities. Amendment 203 is
about extending that permission in enabling legislation to internal
party elections.
Women are
under-represented not only in political assemblies as mentioned in
subsection (8), but sometimes in the upper echelons of those
assemblies. Obviously we would not seek to bind the hands of a leader
to appoint, all on their ownsome, a representative Cabinet. However, in
internal party elections and on other occasions it would be helpful, in
such cases as under-representation in federal committees, to be able to
extend positive
discrimination, should there be a need for that. We hope, obviously,
that there would be no such need. The idea is simply to apply the same
rights in internal party elections as are applied in external
elections. Mr.
Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con): I do not know whether
the hon. Lady is thinking about her own party: when she talks about
internal party elections, would that include all elections within a
party, including the leadership
election?
Lynne
Featherstone: The provision would be enabling legislation,
so yes, theoretically, it would apply to any party election in which an
increase in representation of one sort or another was sought. The
amendment is not directed at my party in
particular.
Lynne
Featherstone: I would not need enabling legislation to
make a bid, should I care to do so. However, it is not my desire to do
so, and I am not talking in a personal capacity. There is no
self-interest to declare in the amendment. However, it would be useful
to find that we are not inhibiting parties in any way from correcting
any imbalance that they might find, and to make that lawful.
As to
amendment 204, I do not know how likely the circumstances it would
address are, and I would like the Minister to clarify whether we are
worrying for nothing. We welcome the changes that the Government have
made to outlaw discrimination by associations, and hope that any club
would enter the enlightened era of openness, eschewing any
discriminatory past that it might have had.
Nevertheless,
the provisions are about ensuring that bigotry cannot hold sway, and I
want some assurance from the Government about what would happen in the
case of a golf club that had to give up some gender-based prerogative
such as, perhapsI do not know about this, as I am not a golf
expertmale-only Saturday golfing. My reading of the Bill may be
incorrect, and my fears unnecessary, but I want to understand that such
a club would not be able to disestablish itself into smaller
associations with a membership of less than 25, to maintain the ability
to do as they pleased, and not come within the Bill. The amendment is
intended for testing and clarification, and to put something on the
record so that that could never
happen. Amendment
205 is about not leaving things to chance, with the possibility that a
Government of a different hue might change the threshold at which the
provision kicked in. Under the amendment, a future Government could not
suddenly decide to change the threshold from 25 to 1,000, which would
allow a host of associations not to be included in the protection of
the Bill. Many of these important discretionary powers seem to rest on
the belief that no Government would ever make changes in the wrong
direction to ease the protection, rather than holding fast to the
protection. I understand why the Government might want to tweak the
numbers to ensure that they are covering the size of an association. My
fear is that if that were not done the proper way round, we might run
into difficulty.
Mr.
Harper: I will attempt to be relatively brief. I shall
speak about the amendments and I might also touch on the clause more
widely. I want the Minister to address a particular situation, which I
hope that she can rule out, relating to the ability of political
parties to take positive action in this way. Most political parties, if
they were going to use the measure, would do so in the way that the
example suggested. I do not think that any hon. Member would support in
any way the British National party using the provision to discriminate
positively in favour of candidates of a particular colourin
effect, to use it in the opposite way from that intended by the
Government. Have the Government thought about that? Can the Minister
assure us, for the avoidance of doubt, that it will not be
possible? When
the clause, much of which has been carried over from existing
legislation, was introduced, it was at that time, I think, supported by
the Conservative party, although we have managed to make considerable
progressof course, it will not be visible until after the next
general electionwithout using all-women shortlists. Indeed, 30
per cent. of Conservative candidates that we have selected already,
without using the provisions of the clause, are women, and that is a
higher percentage than either Labour or the Liberal Democrats achieved
at the last general election. If we had a majority of just one after
the next election, we would have at least 50 women MPs. At
the last general election, we fielded the highest ever number of female
candidates. As I said, we have made considerable progress, although we
shall not see it in this place until after the electors have had the
opportunity to speak, but that goes to show that it is possible to make
considerable progress without the legislative changes proposed in the
Bill by the Government or carried forward from previous
legislation.
The
Solicitor-General (Vera Baird): I have no idea what the
significance of that was, because it was palpably incorrect. There is a
woman candidate in about 10 of the hopeless Tory seats in the
north-eastthat is real progress towards equality for
women.
The
Solicitor-General: Thirty per cent. of the hopeless
candidates in the non-winnable seats are women. That is
greatprogress in the Tory party. On we go; let us leave
reaction
behind. Amendment
203 would extend the provisions in clause 99 to internal party
elections. We are not totally sure what is meant, but granted that it
could not cover the leadership, we had better deal with it, I
supposein a serious way, of course. We are not in favour of
positive discrimination, which is the terminology that the hon. Member
for Hornsey and Wood Green used, and there is no provision in the Bill
to allow positive discrimination, which means discrimination in favour
of an individual just because they have a protected characteristic,
rather than on
merit. The
all-women shortlist provisions have very effectively ensured that there
is a larger number of women MPs in the Labour party than in any other
party by an enormous margin, and those women have been able to put on
the agenda things that have simply never featured in the past, such as
concerns about domestic violence, the
conviction rate in rape cases, child care and better provision for
equality in this legislation and other legislation. All those matters
came from Labour MPs and many of them were initiated by those among the
influx of up to 100 women Labour MPs brought about by the positive
action that we have had the wit to introduce and the foresight to use
in a positive
way.
Lynne
Featherstone: I meant to say positive action. Women
shortlists have been successful, and we want them extended to any party
that wants to encourage such a change in
emphasis.
The
Solicitor-General: That is very good. Of course, the hon.
Lady also ploughs a lonely furrow in the Liberal Democrat party, which
probably has proportionately rather fewer women MPs than even the
Tories. However, there is no doubt that my party is well ahead in this
race. Indeed, the real sadness is that this is not a racethe
other parties simply do not try to catch up and feel no real need to
redress the gender balance.
Mr.
Harper: The Solicitor-General is saying things that she
palpably knows are not the case. The leader of my party has made it
very clear that we want significantly more women in this place and a
more diverse parliamentary party, and he has taken significant steps to
bring that about. As I said, 30 per cent. of the Conservative
candidates who have been selected so far are women, and that includes
our target seats, not just those that we do not expect to win. After
the next general election, the Solicitor-General will find that the
Conservative parliamentary party has a significant number of very good
female Members of Parliament.
The
Solicitor-General: One can only hope so, but it is highly
unlikely. There are 9 per cent. of women MPs in the Tory party and 17
per cent. in the Liberal Democrat party, so it is a bit better,
although it is, of course, very small in Parliament. Half a woman makes
a massive difference in the Liberal Democrat
party.
Dr.
Evan Harris (Oxford, West and Abingdon) (LD): I will not
get involved in that discussion, because I accept that the Liberal
Democrats have not done well enough on the number of women candidates
in the party. I speak as someone who has argued that we could have
taken positive action earlier than we did, but progress has been
made.
However, I
question the Solicitor-Generals view that the only way for the
Labour party to introduce policies that women need is by having more
women MPs. My party does not believe that MPs gender determines
policy, which should be determined by what the party calls for
democratically. For example, we have not had any out gay MPs since I
was elected, but we have been consistently ahead of the
game.
Dr.
Harris: The hon. Lady says Shame, but the
shame is parties not introducing equality policies regardless of
peoples sexual orientation. Individuals do not have to be gay
to want gay equality or to be black to want to
fight racism. That connection should not be made as directly as the
Solicitor-General makes it. It should not require women MPs for us to
have pro-women policies. That is a slightly separate
issue.
The
Solicitor-General: That really is a doctrine of reaction.
We do not know what impacts strongly and sharply on a community that we
are not members of unless we tap into it properly, which the Liberal
Democrats palpably fail to do. I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman has
made a pretty negative contribution. Speaking of Liberal Democrat
policy, when were the Liberals last in government? It was 100 years ago
or just over, and there are about another 100 years to
go.
|
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() | |
©Parliamentary copyright 2009 | Prepared 26 June 2009 |