are all women shortlists a good idea

[lucydogz]

this

Rachel Reeves saying that, where a Labour female MP has stood down, the party will have all-women short lists. Obviously, where a male Labour MP stands down, the short list wll be mixed.

Just as I think, well, I'm not keen on Corbyn, but we need a strong opposition, along comes something like this. Surely Labour should be looking for the best candidates at a time like this? If I was a voter, I'd want my choice of candidate based on ability, not gender.

If the male candidate was brilliant, I'd want him as my MP. And, democratically, I should be entitled to him

appointing a potentially crap woman if a brilliant male candidate was available.

That is literally never going to happen. Candidates aren't tied to particular constituencies - brilliant male candidates will just stand in other constituencies. And you make sure there are at least some good women on the list - which isn't hard because there are loads of brilliant women who've never had a fair chance.

So mediocre women don't get appointed on the basis of women-only shortlists?

MPs get shifted around the country all the time. Favoured candidates get parachuted into safe seats. Your brilliant male MP could be given a seat with a huge majority elsewhere regardless of women-only shortlists.

So mediocre women don't get appointed on the basis of women-only shortlists?

Mediocre men get selected all the time, why should women only get selected if they're brilliant?

Yes, I hear that. But I don't see my MP on just a national level, furthering the cause of my political party. It's more important that they are good at local level. Saying everything's fine because they'll get voted in elsewhere totally ignores that.

See Labour at Holyrood elections in 1999, back then it was Blairite candidates imposed on local parties. Local democracy needs to be nurtured imo. Labour beware.

Have you actually got a brilliant local male candidate being blocked by a list of mediocre female candidates? Because this all seems a bit hypothetical, like the 'what if we elect too many women' scenario.

I can't wait to have too many women in parliament.

I think that the only parliament in the world with 'too many women' is in Rwanda, and that only came about because genocide left them with a country that was nearly 70% female.

I don't think all-women shortlists in some areas are going to have quite the same impact so people can probably stop worrying.

How many women is "too many" anyway

of course it's hypothetical! But it seems fairly obvious that women-only shortlists will mean potentially mediocre women MPs. It's not a good enough answer to say 'well, there's loads of mediocre male MPs'

I think someone upthread just invented the concept of too many women MPs as a way of shoring up an argument on all women shortlists. Hth..

It's not a good enough answer to say 'well, there's loads of mediocre male MPs'

Why not? How do you think those mediocre male MPs got the job? Why do you think there are so few female MPs, mediocre or otherwise? It's because the system is biased in favour of males, mediocre or otherwise. Why should a woman have to be better than a man before they can get a job instead of one?

I think the problem is that I just don't care what the gender of my MP is. And I don't believe many voters do either. Single sex shortlists don't lead to excellence IMO. It's of interest to a small group of bienpensants, that's all.

You don't think you care, you don't think voters care, and yet women are consistently selected against or mostly selected in unwinnable seats.

Has the current system led to excellence? Really?

it's more likely to lead to excellence than women-only shortlists. How can you have excellence when you exclude potential candidates on the basis of gender?
As I've said before - check out Jess Phillips, Dawn Butler - also Pat Glass and Emily Thornberry. All awful (IMO) and the product of this. I'm old enough to remember Barbara Castle - a great politician who didn't need positive discrimation.

Oh god this thread is so depressing

When you have women stubbornly refusing to believe misogyny is even a thing and that if we all just try our best we will be absolutely fine

You cannot opt out of being a minority sadly.

where did I deny that misogyny existed? Of course it exists. I don't think that this is the right way of addressing it, that's all.

What is then, in your opinion?

I don't think Jess Phillips is awful at all.

I also like jess Phillips incidentally

I have no idea, but it doesn't mean that I'm not entitled to think that women-only shortlists are demonstrably a bad idea.

Oh, ok then 🙄

So what's wrong with Jess Phillips?