Women and the Vote

Helen Whately Excerpts

Wednesday 8th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Dinenage]

It is our different viewpoint on things that makes us most valuable.

I am very proud to be a member of a party that had the first woman to take her seat in Parliament. I am very proud to be a member of a party that had the first female Prime Minister, and to be part of a Government where a third of the people attending Cabinet are now women.

[Helen Whately (Faversham and Mid Kent) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend join me in paying tribute to the work of Baroness Jenkin, whom many of us who have recently joined this place have to thank for the enormous amount of support she has given women candidates in trying to become MPs?

[Caroline Dinenage]

Well, yes. We all want to see more women here. In that quest, mentoring is one of the most important things that we can do, and the noble Baroness has been an absolutely outstanding mentor for so many of the women who are among us today. In the other place, there are now 210 female peers, the highest ever number. Two of the three devolved Administrations are now headed by women—