Women: Board Membership

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Baroness Wall of New Barnet

Thursday 7th March 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

My noble friend is right that mentoring is an important aspect of encouraging more women to put themselves forward for these senior roles. That is an important issue that the Women’s Business Council, which I just referred to, is looking at. I hope that we will see some evidence to help us in its report due out later this year.

[Baroness Wall of New Barnet]

My Lords, I am sure that the noble Baroness is aware of the tremendous investigation and work carried out by my noble friend Lord Davies of Abersoch. One fundamental issue that has come through in that research is that role models start very young. Are the Government consciously working to ensure that young women going from schools into colleges and universities—that is, black women and those from ethnic minorities, but also all women—have that aspiration?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

We certainly need to make sure that all girls at school have high aspirations and that we encourage them to be ambitious. If the noble Baroness is around for the International Women’s Day debate that follows Questions, that is an area that I hope to expand on in my opening speech.