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.

I'm trying to figure out if politicians are even human let alone male/female.

Really pissed off that after 90 years of being "granted" the same voting rights as men we are still having to vote for a male majority.

Where is the research into how to make politics accessible to women?

And Thatcher? Well, like a true Tory she pulled the ladder up behind her.

Sorry for ranting, just needed to get that off my chest.

I have never crticised any one for having a view that there should be more women in the cabinet. I am expressing my view that women should not be in the cabinet( or in any other position in any profession) if they are not capable of doing the job.

They should not be in the cabinet or in other position in any other profession just because a quota of women are needed . I feel it is wrong and gives other women in the workplace a hard time as they are always ' you only got the job because you are a woman '.

On merit please not because of anything esle.

Have been in a male majority profession and have been that ' token woman' in the department and really had to prove myself that actually I got there because I could do the job and was better qualified than some of the other candiates .

You know, I've never really understood that 'positive action makes it harder because everyone will think you got the job just because you are a woman' argument. If it was me I'd rather put up with that (and be given the chance to show I was good at it) than not be given the damn job in the first place!

and let's face it, even without positive action you still get mutterings of 'she only got the job because she's a woman'.

"Have been in a male majority profession and have been that ' token woman' in the department and really had to prove myself that actually I got there because I could do the job and was better qualified than some of the other candiates."

Yes, that need for women to prove themselves over and above men is probably because people have a tendency to say things like "They should not be in the cabinet just because a quota of women are needed".

By turning up in the thread and talking about women who get jobs because of their sex and not on merit, you are perpetuating the damn problem. And frankly, if I have to watch my tone because you'll only join my cause if you like how I say things, then I will happily carry on fighting for women's rights without you.

OK so only feminists are allowed to 'turn up' on these threads and other women not allowed an opinion ?

You are appear to be very hostile in your tone and as I said before doesn't do much for your cause.If this is what feminists are like then I rather not be involved in any way to support or try to get round to think like you.

Feminism is what it is, CaptainUnderpants. If you decide whether to be part of a cause based on whether you like the tone of the people in it, rather than whether the cause has right on its side, isn't that rather strange and petty?

Of course women with all viewpoints are welcome on these threads but it seems entirely reasonable for Tortoise to make the (IMO excellent and perceptive point) that you were at once describing how you had had personal experience of a particular problem, and saying things here that are the sort of thing that actually tend to contribute to that very problem. If you think that point is incorrect and want to argue against it feel free, but you're not going to get anyone to change their 'tone' just because you don't like it.

Why should 2/3s of the cabinet be female?

What proportion of eligible MPs are female? I assume there are less women than men meaning there are fewer to choose from. You can't give a job to a woman just because she is a woman if the male candidate is better.

I think Xenia is using that age-old negotiating technique of starting with a higher demand than you are actually likely to get

Thank you Seth.

I don't tend to choose whether to join a cause based on the tone of the people in it. I choose whether I think the cause just and true and right. I'm no longer surprised by women who feel that I have to woo them in order for them to join me in fighting for women, but I am just as disinclined to jump through those hoops as ever.

I suppose my point is I would like 100% one year of new Goldman Sachs partners to be female (as sometimes it's been male) and for that to be so usual no one bats an eye lid. If 100% of the women that year are right and none of the men and same with cabinet great. No reason it should be one sixth or 5/6ths. Some positions of power are not obtained through methods which are fair to women and in the public eye and given the importance of example to young women then finding ways to eradicate unfair selection methods is a worthy task and is not necessarily positive discrimination.

Part of the problem is that women stupidly do too much at home and do flexible working presumably because they prefer scrubbing toilets and changing babies to work. More fool them but it makes it harder to increase the numbers in public life.

I would not go there as the pay is too low and the job security appalling so if you're a successful person of either sex cabinet usually is not tempting as indeed we are seeing - this cabinet is mostly career politicians. Even so it's wonderful. It's a new era. Politicians on the radio and TV can actually speak. you can understand their words. They don't um and ah. There's a coherence to them.

I worked in Parliament for 6 years. It really really is STILL a "boys club" so much wheeling and dealing and "recommending" someone as a candidate happens in Men's clubs, on the golf course....where women are excluded so are massively disadvantaged.

To be a woman in politics you had to do massively more than the men, as they men had these "step up" opportunities thaT women didn't have. Also, of all the active political families locally and regionally, how many political dads were encouraging their daughters to go into politics? Almost none, it was assumed the boys would do politics and if the women wanted to run anything it would be a local charity and "close to home".

Couple this with the insane and utterly unecessary hours the Commons sits for. WHY do they start at 2pm and go on till midnight? There is NO NEED for this. But all these factors mean it is harder for women to get on.

It also does not help that a lot of career politicians are brought up in a home model of stay at home mum supports dad, so women are mums or nannies, certainly not equals in a decision making process so the boys grow up unable to really see women as equals they can discuss things with or be a colleague. So the system perpetuates and there will be fewer women in politics than men.

So what women need in roder to get on in politics is a husband/partner who will support them in the same way as the male MPs get supported by their wives. Problem is (IMHO) men don't want to do this because running a home and bringing up a family and providing support is seen as second rate and unglamorous by too many.

Why can't a stay at home mum be an equal in any decision making?

Well said Soupdragon.

I would like to know what female MPs some posters on this thread would like to have been in the cabinet and how they rate against the male that currently has their job.

So if you think more females should have been in the cabinet please name them - I apparently have a need to develop a view whether men or women are better than each other .

CaptainUnderpants, one of the problems of tying to compare the men with the women is that you have no idea who will perform better at a job until both are given the chance to do it.

The problem here is that women aren't being the chance to have a go.

It's interesting to look not just at the percentage of people that did get the chance who are women (14% of the cabinet are women) but numbers who didn't (of the Tory shadow front bench that didn't make it 33% were women). The Lib Dems also had capable women that they chose not to select for cabinet (Sarah Teather and Jo Swinson are two that I think highly of).

sorry, typo 14% should have read 17%, but still not very good

xenia - Louise Bagshawe (just elected for Corby) is a single mother with 3 children.
I guess she has an alternative income though.
Judging by her last book, where the Americans and the Israelis were heros, and anybody Russian or Muslim was a villain, her politics are somewhere near George Bush.

Interestingly, Louise is the only one of the women involved in tory/union politics at Oxford in the late 80s to have carried on into parliament.

PS: I forgive Thatch for not having any women in the cabinet, because she herself was such a great role model. Its easy to forget that before her, politics was just men in grey suits.

Wasn't Louise at Oxford in the early 90s rather thn late 80s? Based on her age she'd normally have matriculated in Michaelmas 1989, and she definitely overlapped with me.

No, afair, she graduated in 1990.

She went to Oxford in 1989, at 18. So she didn't graduate in 1990. I thought I overlapped with her too!

She cant have gone in 89 surely, I am sure she overlapped with me!

It is all rather a long time ago now...

DH was there 1990-1993 and he knew her at the time (vaguely). And she's less than a year older than him.

I have figured out that I had graduated by the time she was running in the union, and was doing another course (but still living in oxford).

She is genuinely a very nice person.

It is certainly worth making the point but until the majority of mumsnetters when they are deciding childcare decisions - say "oy mate - you might have a penis but there's no reason yo rather than I have to do the dreaded school run or go part time" there is not so much chance of women getting on. You need a mass of numbers. Once there are those numbers women do form their own backstage getting on, clubby stuff - there are plenty of women's entrepreneur groups around so I don't think long term there's a big problem.

Are there female millibands and if so why aren't they where their brothers are? There's a Cameron sister. Why isn't she prime minister? What is the back story to why those men do what they do and not the sisters? It will be a sad day if Clegg's wife gives up full time work and a great pity if Mrs C doesn't go back to full time work once the baby is born. Ms Booth did us proud despite my radical differences of view over her politics.