Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Caroline Dinenage and Richard Arkless

Thursday 2nd July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Dinenage]

I welcome my hon. Friend to her place and as the new chair of the all-party group for women in Parliament. How can we get more women to be local councillors? I know that my hon. Friend served as a local councillor, as have many colleagues across the House, and she will know that women are under-represented on local councils, making up only 31.7% of members. That is why schemes such as the Be a Councillor campaign, which has been run by the Local Government Association since 2012, are important. We want to encourage new candidates from all walks of life to come forward and represent their local community.

[Richard Arkless (Dumfries and Galloway) (SNP)]

Despite the lauded progress that is apparently being made, only 26% of 110 Government posts are occupied by women. Does the Minister agree that it would be a fine time to follow the example of the Scottish Government and persuade the Prime Minister to create a gender-balanced Cabinet?

[Caroline Dinenage]

We have made enormous progress on that and a third of the Cabinet is now female. I do not like the idea of quotas—I may speak for myself on that—and I do not like anybody thinking that the women in Parliament or in our Cabinet are there only because we took men out of the equation. We know that all women in Parliament and in our Cabinet are there under their own merits.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Caroline Dinenage and Richard Arkless

Tuesday 23rd June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Dinenage]

Of course the Department takes any assault on a prison officer incredibly seriously. It is essential that prison officers feel that the full weight of the state is behind them as they fulfil their duties. When there are serious assaults on prison staff, the perpetrators will be prosecuted unless there is an extremely good reason for not doing so.

[Richard Arkless (Dumfries and Galloway) (SNP)]

Given those figures, it might be pertinent to ask whether the Minister’s Department is a living wage employer.

[Caroline Dinenage]

We certainly are, as far as I understand it, and I am looking at that moving forward.