Women: Economic Empowerment

Lord Watson of Richmond Excerpts

Thursday 5th March 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Watson of Richmond (LD)]

My Lords, I suppose, on the arithmetic of the noble Baroness, Lady Perry, I am the seventh of the brave men to have participated in this debate, and—looking at the speakers list—the last. It has been a very good debate, as indeed was the debate last year. If I may say so, I particularly enjoyed the speech by the noble Baroness, Lady Greenfield. It made many important points. I declare an interest as the high steward of Cambridge University. Although some of the noble Baroness’s remarks related specifically to Oxford, they had resonance with me and the Cambridge experience. Incidentally, she made reference to the L’Oreal scholarships. I heard only this afternoon that the scholarships this year include a presentation to Dame Carol Robinson, professor of chemistry at Oxford University. She came out top of the poll on a Europe-wide judgment, not just in terms of the UK. That is excellent.

In 2003, a long time ago, there was the World Bank report on gender equality. I should just like to read its conclusion:

“Gender inequality, which remains pervasive worldwide, tends to lower the productivity of labor and the efficiency of labor allocation in households and the economy, intensifying the unequal distribution of resources. It also contributes to the non-monetary aspects of poverty—lack of security, opportunity and empowerment —that lower the quality of life for both men and women. While women and girls bear the largest and most direct costs of these inequalities, the costs cut broadly across society, ultimately hindering development and poverty reduction”.

Well, here we are in 2015, being invited in this good debate to,

“take note of women’s economic empowerment and the progress in achieving it that has been made in the United Kingdom and internationally”.

We have heard a number of excellent examples of real progress. However, I want to strike a slightly different note. Progress has been made but, depending on how we measure it, there are still many very alarming signs.

In February, the Sunday Times covered an OECD report which highlighted one critical area for the United Kingdom and its comparison internationally. It makes gloomy reading. When it comes to the performance of girls in the UK in the sciences,

“we have one of the biggest gender gaps in the world”.

The OECD report identified that of the 67 countries measured by the internationally recognised PISA tests, the UK was in the bottom five, just above Colombia and equal with Costa Rica. PISA focused on the 13% difference in science between boys and girls in the UK, compared with an average 1% difference across the 67 countries. That raises the question, and other people have raised it, whether girls are inherently less competent in maths and science. That is a preposterous idea according to the OECD. Its report is adamant that there can be and is,

“no biological reason for girls to do badly”,

in science. Professor Brian Cox, whom we see on television frequently, was also reported by the Sunday Times as saying that girls are for the United Kingdom, science and the economy,

“a great reservoir of untapped talent”—

but why untapped?

The article quotes a lady who read engineering at Cambridge 35 years ago, when she was indeed one of the very few women reading engineering there. She apparently said in this report that she thought not much had changed. I am afraid that I must disagree with that. Certainly, engineering at Cambridge is an extraordinary story. It is now the largest department in the whole university. As many people know, it is led by Dame Ann Dowling, who is an outstanding engineer and very successful businesswoman. The numbers registering for engineering in Cambridge are quite decisive. The numbers of women now reading mechanical engineering have risen by 18% in the recent period and in electrical engineering by 27%. In both cases, these percentage increases are much greater than those recorded by men.

The House of Lords committee that recently reported on the UK’s digital future clarified the issues involved a lot further. That report is also alarming. The committee found that increasing the number of women working in information technology could generate an extra £2.6 billion each year—good for the UK, good for growth—but the facts are that less than 30% of this country’s IT workforce is female. Women make up only 6% of the engineering workforce, despite what I said about Cambridge, and only 15.5% of the STEM workforce. Then, there is an extraordinary statistic. Of the 4,000 students taking computer science at A-level, fewer than 100 are girls. Why is that?

The key conclusion seems to be that girls are disheartened because they see STEM occupations as male dominated—which of course they are. Another finding is that some feel that the subjects are boring compared with social studies, arts studies, history of art studies, education and design. If you read Country Life—in many ways a most excellent magazine—you will see that it features a full-page photograph each week of eligible young ladies soon to be married. They all have daunting names. However, if you read the small print under the glamorous photographs, it is striking that, overwhelmingly, those depicted above are described as having or studying for degrees in subjects such as art history, social studies or other soft subjects. I think Country Life has the wrong role models, though I was glad to see that in the current edition the lady concerned is apparently reading biology. That is something. Not only is Britain, and business in Britain, wasting a huge talent pool; so many individuals are denying themselves opportunities, intellectual fulfilment and, of course, superior financial rewards.

There is one further dimension, well expressed in this House of Lords digital report. If IT is our second industrial revolution, sadly, it will not replicate Britain’s commanding lead in the first. As one witness expressed it to the committee:

“The kind of innovation we are getting relies on the whole on young men with narrow engineering degrees thinking about the future … If we want a creative industry, we need a diverse workforce”.

Creativity, as we all know, is the key to a competitive future. Let us also recognise, while congratulating ourselves on some progress that has been made, that the greater involvement of women in the STEM industries is crucial to this country’s competitive survival and success.