A Female Cabinet

[Xenia]

So Mr Cameron let us see if you can achieve 2/3rds of your cabinet female. That would be a good start.

It was hard enough for the poor dears to find a woman to be the Minister for Women and equality (and presumably other "minorities" )

Why would 2/3rds female be good purely because they are women? Remember who turned up last time the Tories found a woman who was keen for a top job?

Margaret Thatcher was wonderful.

Margaret Thatcher deliberately kept other women out of her cabinet. Hardly a beacon of equality was she? Then again, Theresa May, the minister for "those wot iz not white privately educated men", has consistently voted against equal rights for homosexuals.

Why would we expect old Etonians to want to give any power to women?

The new cabinet is exactly what I expected of the Tories.

Margaret Thatcher ruined my community for generations to come. This government will probably finish the job.

I heard on the radio that the leaders wives each received more column inches than any female candidate.

WTF!

Mrs Cameron and Mrs Brown got a lot of media attention, but not Nick Clegg's wife. Maybe because she doesn't call herself Mrs Clegg

Have you never considered politics, Xenia? You would be scary...

The pay is too low and the risks too high. I couldn't afford it.

Really pissed off about this. Where are the women? We are more than 50% of the population FFS.

Shouldn't be put in the cabinet just because of being female - should be out in there because they are capable to do the job. - if there are none that can fit the bill then so be it.

This is what I hate about feminism , makes out women only get jobs because there are a woman not because they are capable of it.

So your position, Captain, is that men are naturally better at politics?

No my assumption is that if there are women out there that can do the job - great get them in but if not a bit unrealistic that women should be in there just because we make up half of the population.

Right. So what's your explanation for the fact that the Cabinet is, and always has been, made up of almost entirely men? Do you think men are naturally better at it, or have they been benefiting from some sort of...what's the term I'm looking for here...ooh, yes, "positive discrimination"?

I mean, if men and women are equally good at the job, wouldn't you expect the makeup of the cabinet to reflect the makeup of the population?

But wasn't Nick Clegg's wife in Spain for a lot of the election campaign as they got stuck by Icelandic volcano ash?

There may be some good women in politics but if they are not up to the mark then they , along with any males, shouldn't be in the cabinet.

I have no view on whether men are better than woman in politics. My view is a general view that women shouldn't be given a job just because ther are a woman. Makes it really difficult for woman who is really good at her jobs (in a male environment) at times to be taken seriously and they got the job becuase they were the best 'person' for the job.

The problem that there are ways men get promoted (and I see it a lot) which are to do with things other than ability. It doesn't matter for those of us who are more competent and out earn the men and more women are millionaires under 40 in the Uk than men actually but it does have an impact on those public appointments and cabinet and board posts. You need a bit more lateral thinking in the appointments and Cameron to his credit has done fairly well on this in increasing the number or women MPs this time but we could certainly do with more women in power and even with the Labour lot with their working class sexist roots, white male fat Scots etc there was an inner male cabal. There are plenty of people int he UK who would be brilliant on the cabinet, probably 100x the number who are considered so it's not that the people aren't there. Anyway let's see how brave he can be. 1 token in a senior post is not good enough.

I'm trying to think you else there is, if you exclude new MPs, who I really think need to be backbenchers for a while (ideally a full term) before they're considered for cabinet positions. It's just a matter of getting the parliamentary experience first.

Best person for the job, regardless of gender...

I don't want Louise Bagshawe, romantic novelist extraordinaire in the cabinet just because she's a woman, I'd want her there if she had something to contribute.

But interseting successful people usually who have done something other than be career politicans for life ilke Clegg or the Millibands tend to make better cabinet members which is one reason Brown brought in a good few people who weren't MPs.

"If there are women out there that can do the job - great get them in but if not a bit unrealistic that women should be in there just because we make up half of the population."

Sigh. There ARE women "out there" who are up to the job! But they dont get the same opportunities, because of sexism. See?

"I have no view on whether men are better than woman in politics"

Well, perhaps developing one would help? I mean, come on, it's not that difficult. Do men have inherent personality traits that make them naturally better than women at being politicians? If so, then wonderful, let's spout banalities about merit based selection, call it done and go out for coffee. If you don't think that, then the matter needs a little further examination.

Saying "I think that women shouldn't get jobs just because they are women" ignores huge layers of analysis. And, by the way, it doesn't happen. That's not how affirmative action works. It's just trotted out as another reason to disparage female achievement.

Please don't tell me what I should have views on -very Victorian and doesn't help your Feminist cause.

But if you have no view on whether men are better than women in politics, then how can yu meaningfully have a view on whether there are "enough" women in the cabinet, or criticise others for having such a view?

If men are better than women in politics, then it's only natural that there should always be hugely more men than women in the Cabinet as they are just better at the job.

If men aren't better than women in politics, then there's nothing natural about the disparity and there are other factors at work because there's no reason the women shouldn't be just as good at the job.

It's absolutely fine not to have an opinion about whether men are better at politics than women. There are a whole host of things about which I have no opinion. But it's at best a little strange, if you have no opinion on the matter, to imply that getting more women into the Cabinet would be giving them the jobs because they were women, not on merit. And actually rather odd to participate in this thread at all. If you have no idea whether women are any good at politics then why do you want to discuss whether there are enough of them in the Cabinet, a question which does rather hinge on whether they are able to do the job?

4 out of 24 (one sixth) I think are women in the new cabinet. Could be worse but needs to get a whole lot better.