Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what steps he is taking to improve the gender balance of the Cabinet Office Board.

Cabinet Office has an ambition to ensure that the male/female ratio at senior levels is representative of the UK society as a whole. Cabinet Office has published a target within the department’s Single Departmental Plan to ensure that 50% of applicants for Senior Civil Service posts are female, by the end of the term of the parliament. Cabinet Office operates a meritocratic recruitment system for internal and external promotions, therefore an increase in female applicants will support improved female representation at SCS level and in pipelines to Board level.