let's talk about women and politics we
make up just over half the population
and this year more women than ever of
running as candidates not to mention
it's the 100th anniversary of the
election where the first woman took her
seat in parliament if any of you are
thinking of making a manifesto Pam
just don't with all that and an
embarrassingly low representation of
female minorities in Parliament why
aren't we hearing more about women in
this election technically speaking women
have never been better represented in
British politics with 206 sitting in the
last Parliament it's really flown up in
recent years and five of the parties are
led by women this time around but it's
still far from equal and it often feels
like a bit of an old boys club calm down
dear calm down
and the women who do make it in face way
more grief from some of the public just
listen to the abuse these MPs receive on
a regular basis a year of my MP you'd
write die you stupid and stay off TV
your face makes me want to vomit a third
of female MPs said they've considered
quitting because of abuse and that has a
big effect one survey found that 50% of
11 to 16 year olds said that being
criticized more than men puts them off
becoming leaders and if you're a female
politician just being heard can be a
challenge
take media appearances female
politicians despite growing in numbers
are featuring less and less in the media
in 2017 39 percent of all political
media appearances were by women this
year it's down to 20 percent although
that's partly because Theresa May isn't
Prime Minister anymore
and frankly when the press do get around
to talking about female politicians it
doesn't always seem to focus on the
policies what is with that women tend to
vote in similar numbers to men but
there's one big difference and it's one
we record and the parties should pay
attention to especially with every vote
being so precious in this election
generally speaking women are more likely
than men to be floating voters for
undecideds that's someone who makes up
their mind on how to vote later or
switches between the parties in tight
races they can help swing the result
this happened in the last election as
labor convinced loads of women to vote
for them in the campaign 2017 morph
women voted labour the men for the first
time in British electoral politics
that's professor Rosie Campbell who
knows all things women and politics the
moment the difference is quite
substantial with about 7% men undecided
it's changing over time it's more women
have got involved in politics women have
become more interested women are
actually free example more interested in
than the NHS than men but less
interested in breaks it but one way or
the other women's votes are going to be
key in the outcome of this election so
an election is called
and suddenly party strategists have to
start thinking about how they attract
female voters perhaps it's got a bit
more sophisticated in recent years that
perhaps women used to be seen as one big
block and now there are much more
distinct offers to different ages of
women women who are working women who
aren't working and certainly more
recognition of how other policies might
affect women when it comes to female
voters there's one giant elephant in the
room pay
women are paid less by the hour than men
by an average of 17.3 percent the
inequality of that really hit home when
the Tories introduced a policy that made
companies of certain size reveal their
gender pay gap that means fighting
against the burning injustice if you're
a woman you will earn less than a man so
with the pay gap exposed like that
surely the parties are falling over
themselves to fix it
that would be a well easy way to get
women's votes no at this election there
are a lot of policies targeted
specifically at women labour says it's
going to completely close the gender pay
gap within ten years
conservative pledges include expanding
measures that support female
entrepreneurs the SMP waltzer up
maternity pay to a hundred percent of
wages for the first 12 weeks the Lib
Dems won't company boards to be 40
percent female the Greens they would
make misogyny prejudice against women a
hate crime with funding and training to
tackle it okay so the parties don't
agree on how to address the pay gap but
lots of them are trying to target female
voters by making promises on maternity
and child care childcare is quite a big
part of this election many of the
parties are offering to extend free
childcare in some form but what's
interesting is that in looking at
different stages so some of the parties
are focusing on very young children from
sort of nine months upwards others are
looking at more wraparound care around
school days and school-age children
currently paid maternity leave lasts 39
weeks but none of that has to be at full
pay look at how that compares to other
countries a UNICEF study said that we're
one of the worst places in the developed
world for maternity leave that doesn't
come as much of a surprise to women in
politics because of how parliamentary
voting works
and MP at the end of her pregnancy once
had to delay her c-section so she could
come into Westminster and vote it's an
obvious point but if it's the men who
mostly write the rules then women's
issues get left behind not only a women
underrepresented in parliament they're
hardly represented at the ministerial
level the place where real decisions are
made over the past 30 years we've never
even had close to equal representation
in cabinet and if you're a woman and a
minority it's even worse
we only got our first female Asian MP a
decade ago and when you look at gender
as a whole it's even more complex we're
yet to see a trans or non-binary member
of parliament and that matters there's
really important trans legislation being
proposed at the moment and not one trans
person will vote on it let's face it the
challenges are stacked against women in
this election in politics they get a
disproportionate amount of abuse and
they still run in the media they get
overlooked and often at times
objectified they still speak up and in
policy they often get painted with the
same brush and they still vote and
despite all that they may well hold the
keys to this election remember women's
tendencies to float their boats and
decide at the last minute could really
swing things the question is will the
parties make them an offer they can't
refuse until next time see ya
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