Women: Economic Empowerment

Baroness Nye Excerpts

Thursday 5th March 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Nye (Lab)]

My Lords, I, too, should like to thank the noble Baroness for initiating this debate and perhaps continue the theme started by the noble Baroness, Lady Jenkin.

It has been 112 years since the Women’s Social and Political Union was formed. Eight years later came the first International Women’s Day. History—even familiar history—can be illuminating, so I looked up the Encyclopaedia Britannica for that year, 1911. It described a woman as meaning a wife, and women as,

“the wife division of the human race”.

We have come on a little since then but perhaps not as far as we would have liked. The “wife division” of the human race then was not economically empowered; nor did it have a right to vote or hold public office. It was also that year Sylvia Pankhurst—I share the view of my noble friend Lady Dean that Sylvia Pankhurst should have some recognition—founded the East London Federation of Suffragettes because she wanted a movement that included women from all backgrounds, especially those from working-class backgrounds, because they had the greatest need of emancipation. The suffragettes wanted to “Make it Happen”—which is the theme of this year’s International Women’s Day. However, apart from proving their worth as war workers, little happened for them until the Representation of the People Act 1918 gave propertied women aged over 30 the right to vote. We had to wait another 10 years before women over 21 achieved equality. I mention this because, in election year, we all have reason to remember those women and to honour their bravery and sacrifice by encouraging maximum use of the precious vote.

I am proud that my party will build on our record of women’s representation in this Parliament because we have more than 50% female candidates standing in our target seats, although there is always more to do. But we have to work hard to find ways in which to engage with the 9 million women who did not vote in the last election and to ask them to not give up on democratic politics. We know that women are worried about the cost of living, the NHS, exploitative zero-hours contracts and the future of their Sure Start, but we have to emphasise that voting is vital to those and other basic concerns.

In doing that, we must never of course forget our sisters who are not properly enfranchised still. In Saudi Arabia, King Abdullah declared that women will be able to vote and run in this year’s local elections for the very first time—although, sadly, they will not be able to drive to the polling stations. In Burma, where elections are expected later this year, it is unlikely that Aung San Suu Kyi will be able to stand for President, because the constitutional clause banning anyone with foreign partners or children will not be amended by the quasi-civilian Government. It is hard to see how the elections can be seen as credible and fair without reform of the eligibility clause.

While it was a step forward that President Thein Sein endorsed the Preventing Sexual Violence initiative last year, the military Government continue to stand by while the violence perpetrated by the Burmese army continues with impunity. The Women’s League of Burma and the UN special rapporteur have been documenting rape and sexual violence by the Burmese army for decades. There was one such case in January this year, when two young Kachin female teachers—Maran Lu Ra and Tangbau Hkawn Nan Tsin—were brutally raped and murdered in Shan State. They had been working in the village for about eight months as volunteer teachers for the Kachin Baptist Convention. The Burmese army arrived in the village two days before the murders, posted guards around it but then left shortly before the bodies were discovered. Burma Campaign UK, in which I declare an interest as a trustee, has called upon the British Government to implement provisions in their Preventing Sexual Violence initiative and dispatch a team of experts to Burma to investigate the case. I would be grateful for the Minister’s comments on why this has not happened. What are the criteria for making such a decision? The international community, including the UN, has repeatedly called on the Burmese Government to investigate such cases fully. They have repeatedly failed to do so. Those 20 year-old women had left the relative safety of their homes to teach children in an area of ethnic conflict.

In Burma, as elsewhere, there is an urgent need for education, not only for children but adults, if the demand for teachers, health workers and better living standards is to be met. As the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, mentioned, Kofi Annan has said that there is no tool for development more effective than the empowerment of women, and that empowerment must include access to education. Educating girls has enormous benefits for their families, communities and countries. The millennium development goal to eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education has been nearly achieved in primary education but progress has stalled. The higher the level of education there is, the higher the prevalence of gender disparity, even for girls living in higher-income households. There are ways to make things better, such as making the school environment more conducive to girls by improving the sanitation facilities, making roads and transport safer, and having more female teachers as role models. It has been estimated that an extra year of primary schooling for girls increases their wages by up to 20%. Mothers with even a few years of education are more likely to send their children to school and have healthier babies with lower levels of child mortality.

The sustainable development goals to be finalised this year include inclusive and equitable quality education, and lifelong learning opportunities for all. I heard the question that the noble Baroness, Lady Hussein-Ece, asked the Minister about whether there will be a stand-alone goal. However, as Julia Gillard, the chair of the Global Partnership for Education and former Australian Prime Minister has pointed out, aid to education has fallen by almost 10% since 2010, compared with just over 1% in overall development assistance worldwide. She calls for the sharp decline in global aid to education to be reversed and for there to be the political will to reprioritise education aid.

As part of that campaign, the charity A World at School has teamed up with campaigners all over the world to call for every girl and boy, wherever they are born, to have the chance to go to school and get a full education. Tomorrow, the A World at School youth ambassadors, Shazia and Kainat, the teenagers injured alongside Malala on their school bus in Pakistan, will share their courageous story and help launch the Stand #UpForSchool campaign to secure a future where every girl around the world is educated and empowered to reach their potential. As part of that campaign, there is a Throwback Thursday campaign, with which noble Lords can join in by posting an old school picture on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram to promote girls’ education and get more people to sign the petition calling on all Governments to keep the promise made 15 years ago. With 31 million girls denied their right to education and more than 500 million girls dropping out before completing their basic education, there cannot be progress on economic empowerment until no child is left behind.