International Women’s Day

Baroness Keeley Excerpts

Thursday 8th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)]

I am sure that I speak for women on this side of the House when I say that we support the sentiments expressed by the previous speaker.

I want to talk about women in sport. Sport is an important part of life for many people, but it is something in which girls and women do not participate as much as boys and men. Many people might be unaware of that. Women’s sport accounts for only 5% of the total media coverage of all sport. It is that absence of coverage that perhaps led to the BBC’s “Sports Personality of the Year” programme producing an all-male shortlist for this year’s final, which quite rightly caused a wave of outrage. I hope that the BBC will not make that mistake again, particularly now that many of its sports programmes are made in Salford.

I am undertaking a Sport England sports fellowship with the Women’s Sports and Fitness Foundation, a great organisation that is helping me to understand the issues of women in sport, so that they can be raised more often—indeed, it is great to raise them here today. We are keen to launch, if we can, an all-party parliamentary group on women in sport. I am pleased that the Cross Bencher Baroness Grey-Thompson has agreed to act as co-chair of the group, because she is a great icon for women’s sport. I hope that many of the Members here today will join the group—I have a form with me, if anyone wants to sign up.

I hope that the woefully small amount of media coverage received by women’s sport will be rebalanced somewhat during the London Olympics, but we also need a long-term change, because despite the focus on the Olympic legacy, the number of women taking part in sport or physical activity has been declining over the past four years. This is an important issue, because sport can improve health and fitness, while inactivity can lead to obesity and heart disease, and affect quality of life. The latest Sport England survey shows that just 29% of women take part in sport once a week, compared with 41% of men. Indeed, the figure for women’s participation has fallen by 2%, from over 31%. That amounts to 6.3 million women, compared with 8.5 million men. The figures also show that 9 million women take part in sport only once a month, compared with 11.5 million men.

We can therefore say that there is indeed a significant gender gap, and research has shown that it is caused by many different barriers. They include practical barriers, such as lack of time, child care, money or transport, but we know that there are also many personal barriers to participation, such as worrying about what one looks like, not having the right clothing or equipment to play sport, or lacking self-confidence. We know, too, that there are social and cultural barriers. Sport in this country tends to be dominated by a male culture, and there are also restrictions based on gender. In football, for example, girls are not allowed to play in mixed teams after the age of 13 in this country, whereas in countries such as Norway, Sweden and Northern Ireland, there are no age restrictions. Indeed, it took a campaign and many petitions on behalf of girl footballers to get the Football Association to raise the age limit from 11, which it did recently.

It is significant that of the 12 million women who want to play more sport, 6 million currently play no sport at all. The latent demand for sport is higher among young women than young men. It seems that the current delivery of sport is not meeting women’s preferences. Perhaps that should not surprise us, when we know that 78% of the positions on the boards of sports national governing bodies are held by men; only 22% are held by women. That affects the ability of those sports bodies to understand and meet the needs and preferences of women.

As for girls, by the age of 15 they are only half as likely as boys to meet recommended activity levels in sport and fitness. I therefore want to talk about the Us Girls project, which is an investment being made by Sport England, as part of the “Active Women” campaign to tackle the gender gap in sport. Us Girls projects will offer young women aged 16 to 25 innovative and engaging ways to become more active in sport and fitness more often. Some 62 organisations will work together to get 30,000 girls and young women across the country participating in sport. That is a great initiative. I hope that Members here today will support Us Girls projects in their constituencies, because more needs to be done to break down the barriers to sport for women, make it more appealing, make women aware of the importance of being active, and develop more healthy and fit role models.

Let me conclude by mentioning some of those role models: Rebecca Adlington, who won gold in the swimming; Sarah Stevenson, the world tae kwon do champion; Keri-Anne Payne, who won the 10 km open water event; Chrissie Wellington, who last year won her fourth Ironman world championship; and the England women’s cricket team and Charlotte Edwards, who just completed a 3-0 whitewash against New Zealand in the one-day international series. May they never be ignored in competitions ever again.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—