Ada Lovelace Day

Gill Furniss Excerpts

Thursday 16th October 2025 Westminster Hall

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Gill Furniss (in the Chair)]

Order. I remind all Members that they should bob if they wish to be called in the debate.

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[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Gill Furniss (in the Chair)]

I am afraid that I now have to limit future speakers to three minutes each.

[Jo Platt (Leigh and Atherton) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Ms Furniss, and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (Lizzi Collinge) for bringing this important issue to the House for debate today.

As we know, Ada Lovelace Day is a time to celebrate the achievements of women in science, technology, engineering and maths. I am honoured to speak in this debate and to champion women in STEM, in Leigh and Atherton and across the country, and to commit to fostering progress in helping women to thrive in these often male-dominated fields.

I will cut my speech as I go along; I always get a time limit imposed on my speeches. I will talk about some of the work that I did before being elected to this place. I think that it is important to mention my time at Leigh Spinners mill. I am the former manager of the mill, and I would often talk about Ada Lovelace when showing visitors around the heritage looms in the scutching room. The punched cards that were used to automate the weaving of intricate patterns were a key part of the tour. It is often said that they were the inspiration that Ada Lovelace drew upon when developing the idea for the analytical engine, which is widely considered to be the first computer.

Just a few floors up from the scutching room, on the fourth floor of the mill, sits the newly formed Northwest Computer Museum, an interactive showcase of the history of computing. It is a brilliant space that connects our industrial past with our digital future, and Ada Lovelace’s legacy is woven through both.

Remarkably, 80% of the businesses at the mill are still run by women. That is a legacy and a powerful example of strong female leadership. I am extremely proud of that project—this is not the first time I have mentioned it in this House.

We must support pathways that nurture future women entrepreneurs, scientists, engineers and tech leaders—and let us not forget the arts, humanities and creative sectors. That means investing in education, mentorship and inclusive workplaces. It means challenging the stereotypes that tell girls that STEM is not for them. It is not just about gender: class plays a part too. Working-class women are doubly overlooked in elite spaces. When I walk into a meeting, I bring my femininity and my northern working-class spirit with me.

Let me shine a light on two examples of brilliant women driving STEM innovation in Leigh and Atherton. Cat is a leading figure at Leigh Hackspace, a dynamic, collaborative hub, based in the mill, where people passionate about tech, science and digital art come together to create, experiment and inspire. It is a space built on curiosity and community, and it is inspirational to see a woman at the helm of such forward-thinking work.

Then there is Emily Simcox of the ComputerXplorers, which offers children aged three to 13 specialist computer classes, offering an engaging blend of fun and education that is designed to capture the imagination, spark their creativity and prepare them for a tech-driven future—

[Gill Furniss (in the Chair)]

Order. I call Jim Shannon.

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[Laurence Turner (Birmingham Northfield) (Lab)]

I am truly grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (Lizzi Collinge) for securing this debate and for her powerful speech.

One of this debate’s origins was a question raised by a pupil at St Thomas Aquinas school in Kings Norton. They wanted to know what more could be done to improve the share of women and girls in STEM subjects and employment. I hope the fact that we are asking ourselves these questions today will be taken as proof that representations to us as MPs make a difference in Parliament. If more time was available, I would love to talk about the work going on in my constituency to sustain and improve those shares.

Many women other than Ada Lovelace have made foundational contributions to the development of science and mathematics, but there is something that draws us back to Ada Lovelace in particular. Her insights into the possibilities of computing speak to us 200 years on—they seem sometimes to be more of our time than of her own—yet she was also unbound by today’s boundaries between arts, humanities and other subjects. As she wrote in one early letter: “give me poetical science”. Perhaps it was Ada Lovelace’s combination of science and poetry that allowed her to see, in a way that no contemporary did, the true potential of the analytical engine and general purpose computing.

As has been said, Ada Lovelace’s comments on the creative potential and limitations of computing, and her foresight about the power of general purpose programming for the common betterment of mankind, speak in a remarkable way to the debates that we have in this House today. On the question of whether Ada was a true programmer, the fact that the first and famous note G contained a very small bug, and that her periods of intense concentration were followed by occasional intense frustration, will resonate with anyone who has engaged in programming.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale said, we should imagine what might have been accomplished if Ada Lovelace, and uncounted millions before and after, had enjoyed the same formal and informal advantages as men. How many great discoveries in the fields of medicine, manufacturing and technology have been delayed or are still undiscovered because there were not women in the room? Towards the end of her life, Ada Lovelace hoped that she would leave a mathematical legacy; the inspiration that she has left means that that hope is fulfilled.

As my hon. Friend said, this is a time to ask ourselves the famous question, “What should we tell our daughters?”

[Gill Furniss (in the Chair)]

Order. I call Steve Yemm.

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[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Gill Furniss (in the Chair)]

There are three more Members left to speak, and I can only allow two minutes each, if we are to get everyone in.