Our thanks to Mike P for this, in the Daily Mail. A link to the Women and Equalities Committee web page on this matter is here. The committee’s report summary is here, the report’s conclusions and recommendations here, the full report here.
The start of the Daily Mail piece’s headline, ‘Will parties be fined for lack of female MPs?’, betrays ideological sympathy with the ridiculous Maria Miller MP, the chairwoman of the Women and Equalities Committee, and other feminists on the committee (i.e. all members other than the newly-appointed Philip Davies MP).
There is no lack of female MPs. It has long been known that the vast majority of people applying to be prospective parliamentary candidates (PPCs) are men. When I worked as a consultant for the Conservatives (2006-8) 90% of applicant were men. There is no question that women are over-represented as MPs compared with the proportion of applicants who are women. This has nothing to do with gender equality, and everything to do with privileging of women to give them well-paid high-profile jobs, regardless of merit.
Excerpts from the article:
The report also calls for an extension of the law on all-women shortlists to guarantee the selection of more female candidates…
Tory Party chairman Patrick McLoughlin told the committee that all-women shortlists caused ‘resentment’ and would not be adopted…
The committee says its ultimate goal is to achieve 50 per cent female MPs. But it says a legal target of 45 per cent is ‘reasonable’.
It also calls for an extension of all-women shortlist legislation, which is currently due to expire in 2030, and which does not cover new elected roles, such as police and crime commissioners.
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