Labour work out the demographic they need to win

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www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/mar/03/i-want-to-give-mid-life-women-a-voice-labours-anneliese-dodds-on-menopause-careers-and-the-wi?amp;amp;amp

Realisation dawns, but not nearly enough is my thought.

Trouble is Anneliese Dodds doesn't know what a woman is. Which might make it difficult

I was going to say that but you beat me to it.

Labour's Stella Creasey takes it a stage further and says a woman can have a penis ;
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10863343/JK-Rowling-wrong-woman-penis-says-Labours-Stella-Creasy.html

Epic fail

She can go fuck herself. She's one of the worst of the devotees. If she had any real courage she'd speak up for Rosie Duffield. But pandering to middle aged AGPs and teenage incels is more her thing.

Oh DEAR - The Guardian has used 'female' as interchangeable with 'women', by the looks of it. Transphobia!!!

Subheader - "The party chair discusses why Labour wants to attract female voters who are juggling child, parent and health care on top of demanding jobs"

Text: "Looking ahead to the 2024 election, Labour eyes are on voters from Workington, as well as Worthing and Worcester – but they are on middle-aged women."

And throughout!
Is there some link between female and women, The Guardian? I could've sworn you said not, not that long ago.

I find it infuriating that Labour are attempting to position themselves as a friend to women. Luckily we have long memories- the responses show it

Dodds announced this week that Labour would require workplaces to produce action plans to support staff going through the menopause. But it is NHS waiting lists and chronic illnesses that are often pushing women out of work, even when they would prefer to stay.

I know the menopause affect women very differently and I would hope employers could be more understanding of the unlucky few.

However I was literally told my training was being block in my 20s as I might leave possibly to have kids was left go during pg - faced prejudiced for having kids and now just as my kids are pretty much independent and I've hit mid 40 lets make employers paranoid about hiring women this age because actually doing stuff like improve NHS access to long term conditions or giving GP better menopause training or access to specialists services things that would actually help is too fucking hard and might cost government some money.

How patronising of Labour. “Oh we need more votes, let’s go and talk to some middle-aged women about the menopause, they’ll be so grateful for the attention they’ll do whatever we tell them.”

What about the erasure of women’s rights and freedom of speech Annelise, which you have cheered along? What about the appalling way Labour continue to treat Rosie Duffield for the crime of being right? What about my right to say a man is a man without being arrested?

I would love to vote Labour again! But not until some leaders with brains and integrity rise to the top of the party. Labour are still trying to work out what is popular instead of working out what the country needs. And it sure isn’t drag shows for babies 🤢

Hey, Labour! If you haven’t got enough votes yet, despite the utter shitshow that has been the last decade of government, do you think you should consider the possibility that you need to change your policies?

You won’t get elected by whining “but it’s our turn.” Give me a policy I want to vote for. Commit to excluding biological men from women’s prisons, refuges, toilets and other safe spaces, and then maybe we can talk. It’s appalling that in 2023 some girls miss school when they’re on their periods because they have no toileting privacy at school from boys.

I'm not sure that "Give Labour your votes, you menopause-havers!" is going to quite succeed as an election slogan in the way that Dodds seems to imagine...

"She will say the party intends to spark “a national conversation” about the lives of mid-life women."

Can't wait for that. What shall we raise in this "national conversation", I wonder..?

🍿

Was wondering what the WI might say to her at the weekend, but then again it might be entirely Stonewalled now

How TRANSPHOBIC.

They are TWAW which is probably why they were chosen might mean no terribly negative headlines

Lol really Labour? This should be a great deal of fun…..😆

Doing your photo op with the WI seems pretty unimaginative TBH.

It’s annoying because both are valid and important topics, but all the concern around menopause is starting to feel like the vacuous virtue signalling around period poverty. The latest hot topics to show really care about women, even while you are brazenly stripping them of their sex-based rights.

As far as I can tell reading between the lines, all the employer hand-wringing about meno has been triggered by a couple of successful employment tribunals and employers waking up to the potential cost (to them) of doing nothing. That, more and more skilled, professional 50-something women in eg medicine retiring early because it turns out a world of work geared to men’s needs doesn’t work so well for women. They’re bending not because they want to change the model to make it fairer to all but because the skills shortages are affecting other people. 🤷‍♀️

Got to be honest here, this sudden political and cultural focus on the menopause unsettles me. And I can't quite put my finger on why it does, because I am a pre-menopausal woman. I should be delighted, shouldn't I?

I think maybe I feel very uncomfortable about my employer knowing that kind of health information about me. I felt the same when I was asked a load of questions about my race, religion and ethnicity after the Equality Act came in.

I feel, maybe, this could be used against middle-aged women. It's yet again something else that positions women as having something biologically about them that is "unreliable".

I dunno. I got a bad vibe about it.

So so cynical. What about all the women they kicked out for knowing what a woman is?

We cross-posted ColdMeg, but my cold, dead heart shares your scepticism. 😉

When it suits them to sniff for votes, Labour are all "women-female-women-female" but otherwise it's all "cervix-havers-menstruators-dinosaurs-bigots"

Labour eyes are on voters from Workington, as well as Worthing and Worcester – but they are on middle-aged women.

Oh I do hope they up their campaigning game and come door knocking in my neighbourhood, I'd like the opportunity to tell them to fuck off. There is no way I would help them win a gold fish at a fair nevermind an election when they seem so utterly confused about basic biology and if they are not confused then they are liars.

I also think the menopause emphasis is suspect, and I would also like a Labour canvasser to knock on my door so I can tell him/her/them to FUCK OFF.

I don't like seeing the Menopause pathologised. Help the women who have problems, but don't make something that is a normal part of women's lives an illness.

What's with the sudden interest in the menopause, and why are Labour insisting we need rights like menopause leave that we haven't asked for instead of the single sex services that we have repeatedly asked for?

I feel, maybe, this could be used against middle-aged women. It's yet again something else that positions women as having something biologically about them that is "unreliable".

yes - and at mid 40s I too should be pleased at all this attention and support but I think it is all noise and little substance with potential unforeseen downsides.

TBH I hope BettyFilous is right and a skills shortage is driving it rather than more nefarious commercial interest sensing untapped markets.

45 to 65 is a really wide ranging group anyway - you've got child free, women with young kids to teens to adults to grandmothers - childcare an issue for some others is elder care and others don't have those issue. Even health wise theirs's huge difference with ages and individuals.

Last thing I read about NHS in Wales - was welsh NHS dentistry might be gone soon - DH and I are already private but kids are still NHS. The kids school are shut due to strikes and they keep losing subject teachers. Educational and NHS are both welsh government run. Our parents over in England are getting some of the worse and some of the best care often in the same bloody hospital.

My Labour run council has just voted though a huge % increase in council tax and a few years ago gave us smaller black bins and has just voted though 3 week collections - no idea how as household of 5 we will manage.

But sure mention some vague menopause ideas and my vote is all yours