A topic for International Women's Day: all-women shortlists
On International Women's Day, it seems appropriate to reflect on the position that women hold in politics, and (particularly) in the Liberal Democrats. On the face of it, the problem looks simple - there are no female Liberal Democrat MPs in the current parliament, and in the interests of diversity and of fair representation, this is something that needs to be corrected in the next parliament.
The solution, on the other hand, is far from simple. One possible mechanism to ensure a fairer gender balance in the future will be discussed at the upcoming Spring Conference. The full motion to be debated is wide-ranging, covering other forms of diversity and under-representation in addition to gender. But the motion specifically proposes to allow all-women shortlists if local parties wish to have them, and to enforce them when a sitting MP decides not to contest the next general election, or in a proportion of cases when a region has two or more seats where we performed well in the last general election despite not winning the seats. That is, all-women shortlists are proposed if the local party wants them, or in a healthy proportion of seats that could be deemed winnable (rather than shunting women sideways into less winnable seats). The aim is to increase the number of female Liberal Democrat MPs after the next general election in 2020.
The debate promises to be lively. On the one hand, there is the question of whether an all-women shortlist can be considered a good (and liberal) idea. Is the concept of a restricted shortlist consistent with a liberal approach to selection? With just eight Liberal Democrat MPs remaining, is it fair to assume that the 100%-male profile of the current MPs is a result of bias in candidate selection? Are restricted shortlists patronising? Will a woman selected from an all-women shortlist be held in the same esteem as a woman selected from an open list? How can we fight against the perception of being a "token woman"? Will all-women shortlists increase the numbers of women putting themselves forward as candidates? Does the end justify the means?
And on the other hand is the knowledge that with our party's deeply-held commitment to equality, we have to do something to correct the imbalance, and that all-women shortlists may be the very tool that is needed to cause a fundamental change in our candidate profile. On these lines, key Liberal Democrat figures have spoken out (on Liberal Democrat Voice) in favour of the motion, in advance of the conference:
- Tim Farron (party Leader): "we have no women MPs any more, just 26% of our approved parliamentary candidates are women, and women are under-represented on many of our internal party committees. We are in a similar situation where BAME, LGBT+ and disabled members are concerned. I don't know about you, but I find that shaming for a party that holds equality as one of its fundamental commitments. In our constitution, we say that we 'oppose all forms of entrenched privilege and inequality.' It's time to show that we practise what we preach. [...] There are those, including women, who have resisted all women shortlists in the past. Some say they 'don't want to be selected as a token', but in our party, no woman ever could. Every female candidate has to be good enough to be approved and good enough to be short-listed by the local party. Any sub-standard 'tokenistic' candidate simply wouldn't get to this stage, especially in our most fiercely contested seats. Some say that candidates should only be 'selected on merit regardless of gender', and that the 'best person will always win'. But the selection system is so skewed by factors like money and time, not to mention unconscious bias amongst local party members, so we cannot say that merit has triumphed if we have no women MPs at all."*
- Baroness Sal Brinton (party President): "It will not be the first time we are looking at these under-represented groups. We were the first party to set up a Leadership Programme (in 2011) to support our best candidates from under-represented groups (women, BAME, disabled, LGBT+) which was successful in giving us a diverse profile in our top seats for 2015, but this did not materialise into MPs. Those good figures mask a further problem: we have far too few candidates from under-represented groups on the approved list so the pool of candidates, especially women, is too small. In the run up to the 2015 election many local parties struggled to find women candidates to stand. This needs to change, and it needs a revolution from the grassroots to make it happen: every activist and member needs to consciously encourage women, BAME, disabled and LGBT+ members to go for approval; for standing in local government seats (in addition to wanting to improve the diversity of our councillors, we know this is often a pathway to being a PPC); and to then stand for seats in Westminster, Europe, the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh and London Assemblies."**
- Baroness Lindsay Northover: "it is clear that merit is simply not prevailing: I am sure none in our party would maintain that half the population does not have that merit, or that BAME people don't, or that LGBT people don't, or that those with disabilities don't. And if we accept that merit alone is insufficient - and it surely can't be if our Commons party is white men only - then we have to take action which makes the difference."***
At the recent Scottish Liberal Democrats Conference in Edinburgh, a diversity motion proposing all-women shortlists for the top Holyrood and Westminster target seats (amongst other diversity measures) was carried by a large majority. It will be interesting to see how the English Party members respond to the idea.