Written evidence submitted by the Fawcett
Society (PVSCB 24)
The Committee has requested views on the government
proposals to:
— Establish fixed term parliaments of five
years.
These will be enacted through several pieces
of legislation, including the Parliamentary Voting System and
Constituencies Bill.
SUMMARY
— Given that the Committee Chair is interested
in, `the widest number of people giving their views' it seems
particularly poignant that no mention of the lack of diversity
among MPs was made in his appeal for public views on political
reform. At present the views and experiences of women are under-represented
in parliament, partly due to their low numbers. Given present
discussion of political reform is imbued with a rhetoric of fairness—why
not tackle the under-representation of women as part of the government's
agenda? — The Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies
Bill is a key plank of this reform, yet it at present fails to
address the major democratic deficit that is women's under-representation
in parliament. We propose scrutiny of how the government's proposed
measures could progress or regress women's representation and
highlight options for amendments to the Parliamentary Voting Systems
and Constituencies Bill by which to increase women's representation
in parliament.
— The current process of political reform
is a once in a generation opportunity to improve representation
of women. The Committee seeks feedback on the government proposals
to hold a referendum on the use of AV at general elections, reduce
the size of the House of Commons through boundary change, and
establish fixed-term parliaments. These are all proposals and
processes which require attentiveness to their potential impact
on the number of female MPs.
CONTEXT
1. Public dissatisfaction with the conduct
of politicians in recent years, coupled with a general election
campaign that was male-dominated and lacked any positive portrayal
of female politicians, has fostered a demand for reform. Women
make up just 22% of MPs, despite being over 50% of the population.
The UK trails behind 57 other countries with a higher percentage
of female MPs. A just and effective democracy should involve and
reflect the needs of the entire population. Women pay the same
taxes as men yet barely a fifth of the legislature are women—meaning
they don't have a fair and proportionate say in how policy is
made and managed. At the present rate of change (just 2% at the
last election) it will take tens if not hundreds of years to achieve
parity between women and men in parliament. This issue is a major
democratic deficit and should be at the heart of debate. Government
also has a legal duty to assess how these measures it is proposing
could promote equality between men and women and tackle discrimination.[41]
2. Fawcett is extremely disappointed that in
addition to the Bill's lack of reference to sex or gender, the
scrutinising committee itself makes no mention of the under-representation
of women in both houses in its appeal for responses. Given the
extreme nature of the deficit of female political representatives,
it is imperative that any attempt to reform the political system
addresses this issue directly.
3. In responding to these proposals we suggest
specific amendments to the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies
Bill as well as broader issues around democratic reform which
have been neglected:
(a) Why has there not been adequate
time given to the scrutiny of the implications of proposed reforms
for the number of women in parliament, or opportunities to improve
this?
Without proper scrutiny a new electoral system
(or boundary changes) could reduce rather than improve the number
of women in parliament. This would reduce rather than increase
the fairness of our political system and make it less democratic.
A switch to AV from FPTP will not necessarily mean increased political
representation of women without additional positive actions measures,
such as reserved seats for women or party mechanisms to ensure
equal political representation of women.
(b) Page 8 of the bill includes factors
which boundary commissions may consider in their working. We propose
this is amended to include the likely impact on the number of
male and female candidates and MPs. The process of boundary change,
together with the reduction of seats, has the potential to affect
the number of women in parliament. For example, if established
MPs lose their seats through the reduction of MPs (from 650 to
600) it could increase pressure on the selection of candidates
for winnable seats. This is likely to reduce the opportunity to
increase the number of new female MPs, and indeed could squeeze
out newer or lesser known back-benchers as established (predominantly
male) names take precedence. To address this, the Bill must include
measures to assess the impact of all reform processes and policies
on the number of women in parliament.
(c) Page 17 of the Bill outlines the
role of the Electoral Commission in promoting awareness of the
referendum and encouraging participation. We propose that the
link between electoral systems and the gender balance of parliament
should be examined and discussed publicly—as something the
general public have a right to be informed of before participating
in the referendum. All electoral systems contain inherent biases
which can affect the selection process, and contribute to the
representativeness of parliament. They may also offer particular
opportunities to introduce positive action measures to improve
the balance of male and female MPs. There must be full and open
discussion of these issues surrounding the referendum to enable
the electorate to make a fully informed choice.
ABOUT THE
FAWCETT SOCIETY
4.The Fawcett Society is the UK's leading campaign
for women's equality and women's rights. Our vision is of a society
where women, and our rights and freedoms, are equally valued and
respected and where we have equal power and influence in shaping
our own lives and our wider world.
5. We trace our roots to Millicent Fawcett's and
the suffragists' successful parliamentary campaign for women's
right to vote. Since then we have continued to work with parliamentarians
on a cross party and non partisan basis to progress equality between
women and men at home, at work and in public life.
3 September 2010
41 General Gender Equality Duty under Section 76A of
the Sex Discrimination Act 1975 ("SDA"). Back
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