International Women’s Day

Amber Rudd Excerpts

Thursday 8th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Amber Rudd (Hastings and Rye) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for North Tyneside (Mrs Glindon). I share her enthusiasm for the scouts and the guides.

Why is there no international men’s day? I cannot be the only Member to have been asked that, not just by acquaintances but by one or two Members. Let me say that it made me wonder why they think like that, before hon. Members hazard a guess about what side of the argument I might take. Why do they think that? The answer is that there is much to celebrate. If we look at ourselves professionally in the country, 42% of all doctors are women, although the figure for consultants is only 31%; in the law, 60% of current trainees are women, but only 21% of partners and only 22% of judges are women. If we consider the FTSE, only 15% of directors are women—that has already been much trailed and debated in Parliament. However, the figure was 5.8% in 2001—again, we must celebrate the progress that has been made. We are making a tremendous effort in all parties with the team led by Lord Davies on the 30% aim. Of civil servants, 53% are women, although that figure is only 35% at senior level. We have much to celebrate, but major problems remain.

We have much to celebrate when we consider the young people in our education system. Every year, when GCSE and A-level results are announced, we hear about the segmentation of the genders and how well the young women have done. In 2011, the girls outperformed by the boys at A-level by 78% to 74%. That is encouraging. In exams and at entry level, women are doing well, but in senior positions, they are not doing so well. For me, that is one of the main reasons why we need an international women’s day. We still have the problem of getting women into senior positions. The Suffragettes thought that the answer was to get the vote, but 100 years later we find that that is not the case. We have not achieved that equality, which they would be amazed to see still eludes us.

The media seem to think that the debate is about whether feminism means wearing high-heeled shoes or pole dancing. In my view, it does not. We must not let that mask the seriousness of what is going on and the economic difference that persists between men and women. Women earn 75p in the pound to every man.

[Claire Perry]

Does my hon. Friend accept that when we consider a group of women in their 20s who are childless graduates, the gender pay gap has reversed, and that they now out-earn their male counterparts? Something sinister is happening as women go up the career chain—perhaps it is child care. Perhaps we should all focus our efforts on sorting that out.

[Amber Rudd]

Some people say that we do not need an international women’s day or quotas and so on because they see younger women doing so well at A-level and at entry levels. However, they fall down at more senior levels.

[Dr Eilidh Whiteford (Banff and Buchan) (SNP)]

Does the hon. Lady agree that gender segregation in the workplace is one of the major reasons why women do not make career progress?

[Amber Rudd]

I think that the main reason why women do not make real progress is child care. We often debate on the Floor of the House who has better answers to that, but we know that child care went up by 50% under the previous Government. I am longing for more initiatives from the Government to build on those we have because I believe that child care is the big problem that prevents women from getting on.

This afternoon, we will hear about individual campaigns and particular issues championed by hon. Members. It will be an exciting afternoon. Many women Members of Parliament have got young women from their constituencies shadowing them. I have Amy Gibbons and Alice Williams from Parkwood in Hastings shadowing me today. I know that they are most welcome here.

We need today to reinforce the message that Members must continually champion women’s lives. Tremendous progress has been made, but the position is still unfair nationally and internationally; the world is still lop-sided. We have an important role to play in highlighting that.

Internationally, 19% of parliamentary seats are held by women, and only 16 of the world’s directly elected 188 leaders are female. Does it matter? You bet it matters. When colleagues here say, “We don’t necessarily need more women MPs—I can speak for the women”, one might tactfully suggest that they look around the Chamber today to see who is speaking up for the women. From whom will we hear this afternoon about individual issues that matter to women and their communities? The answer is, of course, women.

What key issues do I hope will be discussed this afternoon? We will hear about pay, child care and opportunity. We heard earlier from my hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Mrs Grant) about safety, which is another key issue for women. So many women are not safe in their houses. The United Nations has said that one in three is likely to be a victim of sexual assault. Violence against women causes more deaths and disabilities in women aged 15 to 54 than cancer, malaria, road accidents and war. Tremendous progress has been made, but we must never let that make us complacent.

We need international women’s day, not to be just like those countries, such as China, Russia and Vietnam, that make today a national holiday—would not that be a nice idea? Some countries make it a national holiday for women. Perhaps that would get the attention of some of our colleagues.

The serious point is that the personal is political. We need to do more to help women, not just in the workplace, although it is important, not just in schools, but in their homes. We must never take our eyes off the ball.

--- Later in debate ---

[Margot James (Stourbridge) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Worsley and Eccles South (Barbara Keeley), whose interesting speech about women in sport has prompted me to remind the House that Saudi Arabia is bringing a team of athletes to the Olympics that contains no women. We should reflect on the terrible situation that women in that country face in trying to pursue their sporting aspirations.

Staying with the international theme, I attended a conference on women’s rights in the developing world some 20 years ago. It opened my eyes to the fact that, even in the most abject poverty, women are still not equal to men. The position of women and girls—in terms of their rights and basic needs that are not met —is far worse than that of the men and boys in the same, poor communities. A chance encounter at that conference enriched my life and opened my eyes. Wanjiru Kihoro, the leader of a group of exiled women from Kenya living in London, spoke on behalf of a women’s empowerment group called Abantu, and asked if anyone could provide the group with office space in London. We had some spare space, so a month later they all moved in, and they stayed for about six or seven years.

[Amber Rudd]

Fantastic.

[Margot James]

It was. It was absolutely marvellous, and it gave me the opportunity to work directly with those women on their work in Africa. They worked through a network of women’s organisations across the continent, and I went with them to South Africa and Uganda. They wanted me to train women in media skills, lobbying skills and business skills. I was humbled, because what did I know of their situation? Indeed, I always feel that I learned so much more than the women whom I trained.

I am pleased that the UN has named the theme of this women’s day as “Empower rural women: end hunger and poverty”. Rural women and girls make up a quarter of the world’s population, and rural girls are twice as likely to be forced into child marriage and experience teenage pregnancy as girls in urban areas. Despite the efforts of many laudable NGOs and charities, the problems of women struggling in poverty have not gone away, and the gains made are often fragile to say the least, although there have been improvements, about which we have heard this afternoon. Some 20 years ago, there was little understanding of the way in which development policies impacted on women and men, and boys and girls differently. Our capacity to make a difference has been hugely improved by the understanding that unless we tackle the cultural and legal obstacles to the education of girls—their health status, the age at which they marry and bear children, their access to land and resources, which should be on an equal basis to men—poverty and discrimination will persist, and persist for entire communities, not just for the women and girls in those communities.

Microfinance has been successful at providing women with access to the basic raw materials that will enable them to become more independent, and I hope that later in the debate we hear more on those matters, but my time is up.