— The House of Commons should be more family friendly

— This should include better facilities and sitting hours

— Attempts should be made to widen interest in becoming an MP to people in groups not widely associated with the role.

— Women only shortlists and "twinning" are effective and should be further encouraged.

SUBMISSION

  1.  I believe that much can be done to make the House of Commons more representative. Whilst a great deal must rest with the individual parties, we cannot compel people to become MPs. They must volunteer for the role, and we can help make that easier for them by making conditions at the Houses of Parliament as conducive to maintaining important aspects of their personal lives as possible. I will talk mainly of my experience as a female MP and how I believe matters could be improved.

  2.  My first concern would be the difficulties faced by those members with young families and other caring responsibilities. I am aware that all members have to make sacrifices to be MPs, and being away from the family hits both male and female members hard, However, I know from talking to women who are considering standing to become MPs that this aspect particularly affects them.

  3.  To begin with, Parliament needs a crèche or some other means of supplying day-care to members and staff alike. A crèche that provides day care for MPs whose families live with them in London, and short term care for visiting children. Some years ago when I was on the Administration Committee I and other women tried to get a crèche started but it proved almost impossible due to the split of responsibilities in Parliament. But without this we will find it incredibly difficult to get women with young families to become MPs. We also need a proper Children's Room, the arrangements for the Family Room are very inadequate and there is a shortage of space and equipment—especially for older children. It is a tragedy that the needs of families and children were not taken into account when Portcullis House was built. More family friendly hours would also be helpful. As a purely party matter, earlier access to the Whip and no sudden surprises in terms of last minute changes to schedule (regarding, for example, Delegated Legislation Committees) would ensure that MPs from constituencies away from London and the Home Counties would be able to attend events with their children that they had planned long in advance. Changes to more family friendly hours would also be welcome, I know that it was a real blow to MPs with families when the more humane sitting hours introduced early in this government were partially rescinded. Even for those MPs whose families are not with them in London the late night culture is not conducive to many MPs or potential MPs.

  4.  I also believe that becoming an MP is sometimes seen as too great an aspiration for people outside the professional classes and without a long commitment to political work. Ways to make the aspiration of becoming an MP more widespread might include deliberately inviting people from outside the normal socio-economic groups to shadow an MP in Westminster, to see the role from the inside. Many MPs have earlier been active in local politics, I was a Councillor, so it may be helpful to not only encourage women to enter local politics but also to encourage those who are already Councillors to consider becoming MPs. Again this could be encouraged via local work or national schemes. The representation of women on Councils is poor and in Wales I believe there is no ethnic minority woman councillor or Assembly Member.

  5.  Finally, I believe that it would be wise to support women only shortlists and minority ethnic shortlists. In Wales, the twinning mechanism which ensured equal representation among Labour candidates was very successful and was mainly responsible for producing the first gender-balanced legislative assembly in the world. In my opinion these schemes are both effective and help to encourage women who might not normally think of working in politics to do so. Enshrining such procedures in law, and encouraging parties other than Labour to participate in them, would be a huge step forward.