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Like my noble friend Lady Hogg, I was somewhat confused by the wording of the Motion,
as it seems to imply that women might be partly responsible for it. As the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Hudnall, I believe, made clear, virtually all the bankers involved were men. One should also point out that a great many male politicians were also involved. It is about time that the Prime Minister ‘fessed up to his responsibility for a recession that will be longer and deeper in this country. It is not much good always trying to imply that it is purely a global recession. It may be global, but many, including Tessa Jowell, have admitted that Britain is,
which rather undermines what the Prime Minister has tried to claim about the United Kingdom being well prepared for a recession. I forget who said that we need more women at the top. Perhaps it is time to bring back my noble friend Lady Thatcher and allow her to tidy up the mess, just as she tidied up the mess back in 1979. I should be interested to hear the Government’s comments on that.
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I want to talk about two professions, one of which I know something about and one of which I know less about; so much of what I have to say will be based on anecdotal evidence. I will be very interested to hear what the Government have to say about this. As I think most noble Lords will be aware, for a number of years at least half of those training for the Bar or to be solicitors have been women. Even when I was called to the Bar some 30 years ago it felt as though the ratio was about half and half. I do not know whether it was but it certainly was not far off it. However, the number of women becoming QCs about 10 to 15 years after being called to the Bar drops to something in the order of 10 to 15 per cent or less. So, in quite a short time after embarking on that profession, the relevant number drops off dramatically. Although much progress has been made in this area, at the senior levels of the profession, the number of women becoming judges has dropped off even more. The Government should do a lot more to encourage more women to stay on and to increase the number of female judges. I should be very grateful if the Minister would address that point when she responds.
Many more people train for the legal profession than are needed to work as lawyers. Some, having gained a legal qualification, go on to work in a great many other professions. In medicine, for example, the number of people trained is more directly related to the number of doctors actually needed. The Government have a direct interest in the number of doctors that the medical schools turn out: they do not want to have too many and they do not want too few. We have noticed over the past few years—again, this is based on my own anecdotal evidence—that a greater number of doctors are working part-time. That is quite right, too, because a great number of them are women, many of whom want to combine working as a doctor with duties at home looking after children—with motherhood, as the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, put it.
In the medical practice that I go to in Cumberland the number of doctors has increased from about five or six in my childhood to something like 10. That is quite right, because a great many women doctors in that practice are working part-time. It obviously has very serious implications for the training of doctors, as many more doctors have to be trained. I understand that more than half of those entering medical school are girls, or women, or whatever.
Lord Henley: I am sorry, my Lords; I did not get that quite right. In future I will try to leave the “whatevers” out of my remarks. Obviously the number of those going into medical school has to be increased if we are to have an adequate supply of doctors. I should therefore be very grateful if the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, could say a little about how many doctors the Government estimate they will need given the increasing numbers pursuing a career in medicine on a part-time basis.
1.51 pm
Baroness Miller of Hendon: My Lords, like other noble Peers, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Gould, on having secured this debate. The noble Baroness
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The noble Baroness will be extraordinarily gratified at the wide range of different interests that noble Lords from all around the House and from different parties have expressed in this debate. It has inspired everyone to think about the issue extremely seriously, especially because there is a crisis and we need to know what people are thinking. As a result, I hope that noble Lords will not mind if I do not mention any of them by name, simply because they have all said something that was extraordinarily well worth saying and I do not want to use up my short seven minutes with that. Fortunately, I can leave out many of the things that I had intended to say.
I shall draw attention to something that has not been mentioned, which is that most, if not all, of the current problems in this country—I shall leave out politicians and so on, and be very gentle—have been caused by irresponsible banking practices. They were designed not as part of normal bank lending; they arose from the invention of derivatives and other exotic financial gambling devices, which are based not on tangible assets but on what I can only describe as “air pies”. These created artificial paper profits on which huge performance bonuses were paid along with gigantic tax-free contributions to pension pots. What responsibly do women have for this? Very little, because so few women are on the boards or are non-executive directors of the banks that have got themselves and us into this dreadful mess. Without the glass ceiling that keeps so many women out of the upper echelons of the finance industry, there might have been someone to call for more fiscal caution and realism. After all, Prudence is a woman’s name.
I shall leave out several pages of figures, because everyone has mentioned them and it would be silly to continue repeating them. I shall continue on the subject of banking. On both sides of the Atlantic and in Asia, whoever got us into this mess by irresponsible lending to virtually anyone who could sign his name without even the minimal amount of due diligence as to his ability to repay, the figures that everyone has quoted show that it was not the fault of women bankers.
How do we get out of the mess? The mantra is that we have to start lending again, but to whom? It should surely not be to the same speculators and asset strippers that the banks have been financing. I thought that I might talk about business, because when I began my own business—I speak now from experience—the bank would lend me the money that I needed, in addition to the working capital that I had already put in, only if my husband guaranteed it, if you please. I had never heard of anything like that before. It never asked him for a third-party guarantee for his bank borrowing. The suppliers with whom I signed my first contract for goods that would be paid for in advance of delivery asked my husband to countersign, because humiliatingly
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The fact is that a very high percentage of small businesses are owned by or run by women, often while their men are doing some other wage-earning job. It is perhaps no coincidence that in the United States of America this type of endeavour is colloquially called a “momma and poppa” business—with the momma coming first.
In the poverty-stricken third world, a fine, innovative process is beginning to create work and to raise the status of women who are often second-class citizens. I am talking about microeconomic loans. They are for minute amounts, often less than $100, to enable a woman to start a cottage industry—as seamstress, cake maker, cheap jewellery maker and so on. In the vast majority of cases, these loans are fully repaid.
We know that men are suffering in the current situation, and so are women. Thousands of men and women are being laid off all over the place. When people such as lawyers and bankers go, their clerical staff probably go, too, so it is a difficult situation to deal with. Much has been said about equal pay. It is awful that we have not quite got there yet, but that must be achieved in the future.
In conclusion, the role of women in the global economic crisis will be the same as it is in every global crisis; in the words of a favourite country and western song, it will be to “Stand by your man”. I ask you! I should not have said that, because my husband is sitting in the Box. It was a bit foolish. I hope that in future women will be given more respect and influence because, whatever else is the cause of the present crisis, women can truly say, “It’s not our fault, guv”.
1.59 pm
Baroness Greengross: My Lords, I am not sure how to follow that. I add my sincere congratulations and thanks to the noble Baroness, Lady Gould. Last week I was privileged to introduce a debate that called attention to the case for maximising the talents and skills available to our nation if we are to ensure its future economic prosperity. Women’s skills frequently remain undervalued in our economy, in spite of the advances that we know have been made. Still, only 12 per cent of directors on FTSE 100 boards are female. It is often suggested that better governance comes when there is a rich variety of people among the main decision-makers. However, when 52 per cent of the population are frequently bypassed, such diversity is clearly compromised.
I declare an interest as a member of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, which recently stated that 85 per cent of women work full-time before having children but that just 34 per cent of working mothers with pre-school children work full-time. That
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By providing women with flexibility and ensuring their equal rights, the UK can, or could, utilise their talents, which would help to lead the country out of this recession. The Women and Work Commission estimates that closing the gender skills gap would boost GDP by between £15 billion and £23 billion annually. Back to Work and Train to Gain programmes should reflect the flexible nature that many women carers need to be able to maximise their skills and get back into the workforce. The recent report Are Women Bearing the Burden of the Recession? by the Fawcett Society called for such measures to be taken to ensure that women know their rights when it comes to caring entitlements and that they have every opportunity available to them. The UK will need an additional 5 million highly qualified workers within the next 10 years to compete globally.
Currently, 50 per cent of women working in low-paid, part-time jobs are working beneath their potential. That was acknowledged by Opportunity Now in 2007. Moreover, 5.7 million women are in part-time employment, compared with just 1.8 million men. The preconception is that these women will be the first to go in a recession. We are seeing reductions in part-time hours. However, as businesses downsize and reduce their spending, such flexibility should be valued rather than ignored.
With significant increases in the numbers of women in employment over the past 30 years, women are more directly exposed to the impact of the recession. It has been suggested that while early job losses have hit sectors with a high concentration of men, such as manufacturing and construction, there is now a drastic increase in the number of job losses in the sectors that mainly affect women, business services and retail. Lack of growth in the service sector, where most jobs for women have been found over the past decade, could cause us many problems in the future.
It is essential that the Government provide equal opportunities to both men and women to support us all in this crisis if we are to encourage successful competitiveness and an economic upturn when we get out of this recession. We cannot let the recession lead to an upturn in illegal discrimination. Flexibility is essential when demand is fluctuating, which it is and will continue to be in the short term at least.
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We want women who are willing to be flexible at a time when companies are, or should be, seeking flexibility. Women are not men and they often want to work differently. That should be encouraged, not restricted. We need all our population’s skills to be fully utilised. We must make that happen.
2.05 pm
Baroness Massey of Darwen: My Lords, I, too, am very grateful to my noble friend Lady Gould for yet again—it does come round quickly—securing this debate on women, and for introducing it so vigorously. So far, it has been one of the most varied of debates—“simply the best”, to quote the extraordinary Tina Turner.
I shall focus indirectly on economics and finance but mainly on what women do in crises: how they respond, how they cope and how they often act out of love rather than hard-edged financial considerations. I shall use as my example that of family carers and, in particular—this was mentioned earlier—grandparents. Family carers are mainly women and it is likely that they will be relied on even more in a financial crisis. The issue of family carers is global and very much accepted in many societies. I shall speak about the situation in the UK, which tends to be more problematic. I ask my noble friend the Leader of the House, first, whether she is aware of the uneven treatment of grandparent carers and, secondly, whether she will support measures to address the anomalies.
The most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury, addressing the economic crisis, said in a lecture last weekend:
“Any morally and practically credible policy should be looking to guarantee that future generations do not inherit liabilities that will cripple the provision of basic social care”.
He spoke of "radical insecurity" and of asking difficult questions about how we run our lives. As a humanist, it is not often that I quote religious leaders but the most reverend Primate was absolutely right to speak of moral imperatives. My noble friend Lady McIntosh echoed his sentiment.
We have a moral imperative to support kinship carers. However, that is not only a moral imperative; it also makes economic sense, yet we seem reluctant to take the necessary steps. Let me elaborate. There are more than 200,000 grandparents—that is probably an underestimate—mainly women, caring for their grandchildren due to the drug or alcohol use, the death, the imprisonment or otherwise unsuitability of their own children to be in charge of their own children. Many grandparents give up their jobs to be carers, with all that that means in a financial crisis. Many say that they cannot enjoy their grandchildren in the way that most grandparents can because they have total responsibility for them. They need help. I will go into more detail on this in a minute.
I met a grandmother a few months ago in my capacity as chair of the National Treatment Agency for Substance Misuse. She had had her three grandchildren, who were aged 10, six and two, left with her one midnight because her daughter had died of a drug overdose. The grandparent had a one-bedroom flat and no money. It took 18 months to be rehoused. She lived in poverty and found the system of getting
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Practice varies from local authority to local authority. Some local authorities now have a dedicated worker to support kinship carers through the trauma of the grief and stress that they experience but most do not. Solicitors are now challenging and winning cases against local authorities on behalf of grandparents because they are not receiving all the financial aid that they are entitled to. Legal battles cost money—how much better it could be spent.
Other problems are associated with this. Many kinship carers do not become foster carers because of the possibility of the children having to go into care before this can happen. Some are told they are too old to become foster carers. Special guardianship allows the person with care to claim means-tested benefits and receive child benefit. Grandparent carers are often pushed towards a residence order, which tends not to have financial support. Parental responsibility, and therefore child benefit, can still remain with the parent, if he or she is alive. There have been cases of carers not being allowed to claim benefits because they were receiving allowances as kinship carers.
Family or kinship care is clearly being used as a cheap option and plays on the devotion of adults who make sacrifices for children. They frequently have no immediate help for clothes, beds, uniforms and so on. In one case, two sisters were removed from their parents. One went into foster care, the other went to her grandmother. The foster carer could claim allowances for a school uniform but the grandmother could not. Both sisters attended the same school. One child had a uniform, the other had what the grandmother could get her hands on, and one can imagine the impact of that on the girls.
Yet outcomes for those in kinship care are better than those for children who go into non-kinship care. The children do better at school and have fewer social problems. The cost of supporting a young person who ends up in a young offender institution is, I believe, something like £30,000 a year. How much better it would be to provide care in the first place which might avoid the problem and to pay family carers to take over that child.
A report from the organisation Grandparents Plus, due out on 26 March, points to many of these anomalies—in particular, to the financial hardships and lack of support suffered by many grandparents who care for their grandchildren. It points out that in the current economic climate, four out of 10 parents are likely to turn to grandparents to provide help with childcare. This problem of kinship carers, including grandparents, is almost invisible in UK family policy, yet survey after survey of grandparent carers—as I said, mainly women—very often reveal a lack of information and advice, a lack of financial support, a lack of practical help, a lack of professional help with the children and a lack of peer groups who can offer support. This Government have been very supportive of children and families, so I ask the Minister again whether, in policy discussions and in relation to future
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2.12 pm
Lord McColl of Dulwich: My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Gould of Potternewton, on introducing this important debate.
As a surgeon, I have always been interested in preventive medicine. Thinking about prevention made me wonder whether the economic catastrophe could have been prevented. It reminded me that the origin of the word economy is the Greek word oikonomikos, meaning the management of the household, most of which is done by women. In Glasgow, where I was brought up, the man would bring home his wages at the end of the week and give them to his wife, who would manage the domestic finances and give him his pocket money. When the Mildmay centre was established in the 1980s in Uganda as the first hospice in Africa for people dying of HIV/AIDS, we would lend £50 to enable a woman to set up a small business to help her and her family to survive. We lent the money to the women, never to the men. Later, we used the same practice in West Africa working on Mercy Ships. I have seen this kind of microfinance work very well on the Indian continent as well, and it is always the women who are trusted, not the men. As noble Lords will know, the French word for microfinance is “la micro-economie”, a feminine noun. Microfinance is female through and through.
Would this economic downturn have occurred if the banks had been run by women? Women tend not to be the gamblers that men are, and it is doubtful whether they would have taken the huge risks in which many banks have indulged. Furthermore, would a woman Chancellor of the Exchequer have bailed out and rewarded the gambling bankers and, at the same time, penalised the prudent savers? The effect of the economic downturn is that women will suffer most, as has been said. They are the most vulnerable members of society and they will be placed under much more pressure as jobs become scarcer.
Thinking of the world scene, what effect is the downturn likely to have on the human trafficking trade, which is worth £30 billion? Some hope that, as there will be less money around, the demand for prostitution and human trafficking will decrease. Others fear that it will increase. As poverty increases in many of the poorer countries, women will inevitably become desperate and even more susceptible to trafficking and abuse.
Human trafficking affects every country in the world and involves 12 million people, who are in forced labour or sexual servitude. Of these, 2.4 million have been trafficked. UNICEF estimates that one child is trafficked every 30 seconds. Save the Children estimates that 5,000 children are in prostitution in the United Kingdom, nearly all of whom have been trafficked.
A typical example of trafficking was Anna, who at the age of 18 was sold into the sex trade by her father in eastern Europe. She was smuggled into London, where her life became a living hell as a sex slave, required to service 50 clients every day for five agonising
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