So says Harriet Harperson. Apart from the fact that she declared something so fundamental as the make-up of a shadow cabinet as something that should happen without due democratic process, is such selection a particularly good idea? Women politicians are potentially as good at their jobs as men, it's just that if on a particular occasion there are men with better talents, then selection by gender would mean a weaker shadow cabinet. Her statement goes on to say that this would ensure "better decision-making than a majority of men",
No, Harriet, it would not. Women politicians are quite capable of making the same monumental cock-ups that men can make. And sweeping statements like the above in some measure bear this out.
Story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/politics/10303473.stmShe is very wrong. I'm all for women in government. In the long term I'd like to see the numbers loosely match population figures, but this has to happen naturally and according to ability.
When Margaret Thatcher got in I was pleased since I hoped that a woman would apply different skills/viewpoints. I was also sure she'd take many more women into power with her and break the monopoly on top jobs that applied to men.
I don't regret her winning at all, but in the end it seems she got there not by being a woman, but by being more of a man than her competitors. We still didn't get the viewpoint of the average woman represented and any decision-making I gather was done by her alone.
I'm sure Harriet is imagining a bunch of women sitting around knitting, comparing photos of grandchildren and amicably discussing new policies, but that is just a fantasy as those women tend not to become MPs"Harriet Harperson" will always think of her as that from now on.
There will only ever truly be true gender equality when the best person, no matter which sex, is chosen for the job and paid the same.
I dip into a forum where there are lots of very angry feminists who were vociferously insisting the other day that women would be just as excellent terrorists, warmongers etc as men if they were only given the chance, but I'm not sure they realised how loony they sounded.
There will only ever truly be true gender equality when the best person, no matter which sex, is chosen for the job and paid the same.
I don't know of any evidence that this is not so within the Labour party already, at parliamentary level at least. The difficulty is that neither the average voter, nor the average Labour selection committee will always select on that basis. And you'll never get over the fact that fewer women actually want to be politicians so the pool of female talent will be smaller.
will always think of her as that from now on.