After last summer’s elections in Great Britain, women made up only 118 of 659 politicians elected to the House of Commons. Great Britain is now considering requiring political parties to nominate women. Is this legal or even a good idea?
In the 1990s, Great Britain experimented with a system that forced parties to nominate more women for the British version of primary elections. That system was ruled illegal when it was challenged by law professor Peter Jepson.
On Jan. 28, Parliament approved a bill that would reinstate this system, essentially allowing political parties to engage in “positive discrimination” that would be illegal for private entities to do.
It is not clear that this is either legal or desirable.
Jepson told Women’s ENews that he would again challenge the practice, this time under European Union law. “I’m not at odds with the Labour Party over the inadequate representation of women in Parliament,” Jepson told Women’s ENews, “But there is nothing positive about discrimination.”
Current Member of Parliament Anne Widdecomb said she opposed the planned change not only because it would violate the human rights of men, but would also create a two-tiered group of female MPs. Widdecombe said,
It would create two groups of women MPs, one who could look everyone from the prime minister down in the eye, and the other that got there because of special favors. I wouldn’t find that helpful. I’d find it humiliating.
Widdecombe believes that the gender balance will shift when women who grew up in the 1980s when Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister reach their 40s and 50s. Even then, though, it is questionable if women will ever achieve the exact 50/50 split that some feminists seem to desire.
By comparison, Women’s ENews notes that only 14 percent of U.S. House of Representative members are women. That percentage will almost certainly be higher 20 years from now, but I suspect the same sort of factors that result in a rather persistent wage gap will also result in large gender imbalances in democratically elected legislatures.
Source:
British Parliament passes bill to elect more women. Paul Rodgers, Women’s ENews, February 15, 2002.