And another thing…

Hmmmm, however that you bring the law into is, since the BNP has just been smacked down by various laws developed by the equalities commission there must be a badly written law within the scope of non discrimination on gender/faith/race etc that would surely make all-women short-list illegal! I mean come on, that everything else must now be equal and without prejudice surely the idea of all female short-list is for all intents and purposes breaking this idea! Because although admirable in aims the way of getting women shoed in to parliament by excluding all men is wrong, cutting the number of potential candidates by 50% and stopping constituents have a real choice.

I think discrimination through gender is wrong.

I am totaly against any from of discrimination without just cause. It is a pity that out political parties all do.

Labour of course rule by fear as you have said Tom and that you were afraid to speak what you believe as you would never have beed selected. so you are a yes man or you were.

I noticed this in todayd DT.

“Energy companies have privately warned the Government that its climate change targets are “illusory” and “delusional” as global leaders prepare to sign up to stricter guidelines at the Copenhagen climate change conference in six weeks.”

Again this has been known for years but it is only now they have spoken as they know you are on your way out. Again labour have ruled by fear.

Its Labours head in the sand again and beleving your own propaganda.

Pathetic.

Labour needs to face up to the truth on so many things,

Politics has become so overtly underhanded that it’s enough to make you want to puke. How did we end up with you sad bastards in charge?

Ah c’mon, c’mon, weren’t the Blair quote unquote babes one of the great successes of our times.

I mean look at…, for instance…, or how’s about… or ???????

Ok point taken.

Select the best candidate (boy or girl), from the long list.

Even geniuser…

Once again the Tories boldly go where Labour have gone before.

There’s a list on the Mail Online of these parliamentary hopefuls (‘Cameron’s Cuties’ is the sick-making soubriquet they’ve given them). They include:
Debi Jones – TV and radio host. Once jumped into the world’s largest jelly for BBC’s Children In Need.
Mimi Harker – guest presenter on the QVC shopping channel.
Anna Soubry – former Central News presenter.
Esther McVey – former GMTV presenter.
Caroline Righton – former TV-am presenter.

Anyone notice a pattern emerging here? However, Margot James is not a lady TV presenter (former or otherwise), but she does live with one. So she also ticks the ‘gay’ box on Dave’s diversity check list. Also included is Sian Flynn for Cornwall North – ‘a surfer and passionate believer in the power of the arts to unlock human potential.’ So she ticks the ‘woolly-minded Hippie’ box. (Dave’s particularly keen on them.) Also included is Annunziata Rees-Mogg. She ticks the ‘daughter of William Rees-Mogg’ box.

Lots of howls of protest from (usually pro-Tory) Daily Mail readers in the Comments section, eg

wow so many more good reasons not to vote tory anymore (yes i was a tory supporter until he became leader).

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1222796/Camerons-cuties-The-80-women-likely-MPs-Tories-new-female-friendly-party.html#ixzz0Uxh4tyT6

“I still don’t support all-women shortlists. On the other hand, I can’t see any alternative to increasing the numbers of women in the Commons”

Unless you think that a persons gender makes a difference to their ability to represent their constituents, the actual number of women in parliament is irrelevant. All that matters is that there are no barriers to entry based on gender. All-women shortlists do not do this, the just create further injustices.

But it’d still be illegal for a hospital or school to decide it wanted all male selection to help get more male nurses or teachers?

One rule for us …

All female lists actively encourage carpet-baggers from outwith a constituency, being parachuted in by Party headquarters. This is the very best way to piss off local loyal supporters. John Reid’s constituency in Airdrie will be up in arms if they have this imposed on them, when he steps down at the next election. Selection must always we made locally, subject to the usual party screening, and regardless of sex.
Excluding the best candidate is the very best way to lose an election.

“Excluding the best candidate is the very best way to lose an election.”

And the “best candidate” could only ever come from within the constituency, never outside it, presumably?

Positive discrimination seldom satisfies: the favoured are patronised, the disfavoured feel victims of an injustice.

I think, though, that there is a case for increasing the numbers of women in Parliament simply because they have an awareness and better understanding of issues that affect women. More might be encouraged to stand if it didn’t seem such a bear pit.

The significance of the announcement which included the diversionary all women shortlists was that Tory HQ will be choosing all the remaining shortlists for the 2010 election, which include replacement candidates for 15 or so sitting MPs.

It has been speculated that Chameleon hopes thereby to get Chameleoid candidates – male and female – chosen for these prime seats.

However, as Cashcroft bought his way into Tory Central Office, and his people, who reputedly have more office space than Chameleon, are i/c marginals & campaigns it seems likely that the Belieze Special Envoy or whatever his role is, who has recently bought up a supposedly neutral political website, has his fingers in this pie also.

I saw the results of a poll of conservatives of whom 80% objected to central selection of shortlists.

Any conservative who cares for their party should act soon, it will be too late.

Is Hopi Sen right – that the change is much mor4e fundamental than women-only shortlists and actually means Central Office now control every selection in every constituency. With an unprecedented number of seats becoming vacant thanks to the expenses thingy that means Cameron is in a position to stuff the benches behind him (wherever they may be) with people approved by him and who kinow they owe their presence there to him.

Hopi says: “what Cameron is doing is using a bomb blast to mask a rifle shot…
From now on, no-one will be selected as a Tory candidate without the direct approval of CCHQ – either by CCHQ and a local party drawing up a shortlist together until Christmas, or after January, by CCHQ drawing up a shortlist themselves.

Full post here: http://hopisen.wordpress.com/2009/10/21/tory-all-women-shortlists-masks-cchq-power-grab/

Is he correct?

I tweeted to the effect of my post above (thanks, Tom) a while back:

http://twitter.com/Quietzapple and here and there elsewhere too.

Quietzapple and Pete B are right. This is much more significant than what Cameron said to the Speaker’s committee about AWS. How many new Conservative MPs will feel able to rebel against their party, particularly regarding local issues, if they owe their seat to CCHQ? They’ll be so, so loyal.

If I were a local party member and activist, I’d not just be very worried at this level of patronage from the “powers that be”, but I’d also be a little annoyed that I was expected to go on raising money and posting leaflets, without much say in choosing my next candidate.

In fact, he only said that there “could” be all women shortlists. And he didn’t say they would necessarily be in winnable seats.

And even those women who get elected from an AWS will have to face the contempt of Ms. Dorries, who views such women MPs as second class, and who won her seat on merit, apparently!

It appears these days that if you are white, male, straight and indigenous (as Griffin put it,) you’ve had you’re chips. Unless of course you’re in your late teens, good looking, and an X-Factor contestant.

Whatever happened to talent, regardless of age, gender, race or sexual preference?

@ Rapunzel

True those are concerns.

Still more imho is the worry that MPs are there courtesy of foreign based billionaires. Bad enough that the Barclays, Murdoch, Sullivan & co have a bigger say than the rest of us.

Those who live abroad have different interests and concerns from UK residents, and it is already clear that MPs have been generally out of touch with the electorate so far as income is concerned, if the expenses imbroglio is so interpreted.

Cashcroft might as well live on the moon But he has more office space in Tory HQ than Chameleon.

I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m thoroughly sick of all the tiresome, interfering wimmin in the Labour party. So can you please have men-only shortlists instead?

I think worse than all-female or all-male shortlists are shortlists or simply candidates imposed on Branches by party HQ.

Rarely happens in all the parties, but where it does, or worse where a local branch are told they’ll be selecting X whether they like it or not, democracy is lessened.
OK, sure, the voters have the say in the end. But since many voters vote for their chosen party often regardless of candidate, and in some areas seats are considered “safe”, the parachuting in of a candidate by London is akin to selecting the MP without even the local party members having a say. Cannot be a good thing.

Personally I’d welcome more women getting involved in politics. I keep trying to persuade the missus to join the party, we could well use her skills of persuasion (not to mention manipulation, conniving, intimidation, fear-mongering..Oh, is that you dear? Oh, erm, nothing dear).
Sadly though, not many women are interested in the nitty-gritty of party politics, if only because of the stuffy “old-boys” feel of many parties; even the SNP is not immune to it (although I’d say the figures show we have a pretty good lead over the London parties here, as in many things)

Frank, I’ll ask.

Is all women shortlists throughout the Tory Party a reciprocal option?

I was hoping you might make the case against women’s shortlists on the basis that gender discrimination is wrong in principle, rather than because you were once “a young man with parliamentary ambitions”.

Ambition versus principles. No contest, is there Tom?

Just figured out a way for Labour to win the next election: pass a law forcing all-Labour shortlists for every party.

Tom

Countdown To Abdelbaset al-Megrahi’s end of compassionate release
currently
16 days

Some Nationalists are saying about the countdown clock on my blog

Do yourself, and others, a favour and get rid of your Megrahi ‘count-down’. In my opinion, it is ghoulish, degrading

entirely agree with Brownlie, your Megrahi thing is so tasteless. I didn’t think you would stoop to the level of Scotsman journalists.

do you think it is ???

Is it possible that women don’t particularly want to be in Parliament?
I ask because there are no obstacles to entering the blogosphere, yet the vast majority of bloggers are male.
I suspect that women are happy to let the boys play games, while they get on with the important work.

Further to my previous comment, might I ask that the Labour party have not just men-only shortlists, but 60+year-old-pipe-smoking-men-only shortlists? That would bring back Clem Attlee, Harold Wilson, and Tony Benn. Or the old, original flavour Labour party before the New Recipe was invented and foisted on unsuspecting buyers. Who knows, I might even vote for them.

Quietzapple, I’m more than happy with a reciprocal arrangement whereby the Tory party has twenty-something-year-old-women-only shortlists. Tory women are always far more interesting than Labour wimmin. Who knows, I might even vote for them.

ARGRHHHHH

I’ve just had a vision of 200 Margaret Thatchers being sworn in to Parliament when Labour get dropped on their arses in May

Andrew around 80% of MPs are straight while indigenous males.

Do you truly attribute this to the fact that they are all more talented than anyone else?

The recent expenses nonsense surely suggests otherwise.

I personally suspect this is merely intended as a wake-up call to those constituency parties that haven’t yet chosen a candidate.

Pick one, or we impose one.

———-

BTW, mobile posting still broken. Keeps telling me I need to enable cookies (done) and enable Java (done).

Was this deliberate? Is it only me having the problems?

[...] Tom Harris attempts to make a party political issue out of all women shortlists [...]

The imposition of all female short lists will do for feminism what the BNP are doing for race relations.

Why don’t more women go in to politics? For the same reason that they don’t get through the glass ceiling in many other professional contexts. The terms and conditions of employment don’t actually suit family life particularly well.

The way that Parliament (and I assume you mean Westminster) operates was set up around lifestyles that even men don’t live any more.

Change the way that it operates and you will get more women.

Frank:

Noo, the deal is all Tory MPs & Councillors female, all Labour ones Male.

You obviously have not examined the pysogs pf Chameleon’s Chimeras:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1222796/Camerons-cuties-The-80-women-likely-MPs-Tories-new-female-friendly-party.html

Never seen so many in line likely to emulate Caro Spelman, who exploited her parliamentary expenses to employ a nanny while pretending she was clerical staff.

Amid all the moats, wisteria & multi-millionaires wanting another extra house that was the one which got up my nose.

Exploiting one’s children isn’t done, old chap. Well, not in my circle.

Indy

“Do you truly attribute this to the fact that they (white, indigenous, & male) are all more talented than anyone else?”

Quite the reverse. If there were white, indigenous, male-only shortlists I would argue as strongly against that!

Positive discrimination based on race or gender, is nearly always used against the group of individuals in society that I’ve described. But ‘positive’ discrimination is still discrimination, and will alienate those being discriminated.

And yes, if 80% of politicians are white, male, and indigenous, that still doesn’t mean they are our most ‘talented’ people either.

The police force does not have enough ‘hoodies’. Now some people say this is because there is a shortage of ‘hoodies’ coming forward with the requirements needed to be an efficient policeperson. I have the answer. Don’t make efficiency the priority, make it being a ‘hoodie’. Create ‘hoodie’ shortlists. Simples.

Tom just to get back to real politics.

You wil enjoy reading this.

http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/2009/10/27/poll-predicts-labour-trouncing-91466-25020815/

Oh, is Hopi Sen a bloke?

More than ten years after women-only shortlists were attempted in Labour, even that party still has the imbalance. Local parties are more likely to select members of whichever group is more likely to be represented in nominees, and if white men are more likely to seek nomination…

>> Andrew around 80% of MPs are straight while indigenous males.

This’ll come as a surprise to Peter Hain.

>> Do you truly attribute this to the fact that they are all more talented than anyone else?

>>The recent expenses nonsense surely suggests otherwise.

Female MPs have been just as represented in the scandal. Plus, talented could mean an ability to cook the books.

But Andrew you said that selection should be based on talent. That is the argument that is always put forward against gender balance mechanisms. We should select candidates based on talent rather than gender etc. If that argument was true then we would at present have a Westminster Parliament bursting at the seams with talented people, who just happen to be 80% white heterosexual straight men.

I don’t think anyone could make that argument and keep a straight face however.

I don’t understand why parliament should ‘Look like’ the country.

What has that to do with eficiency?

Efficiency.
Sorry.

When men vote for men, that’s sexism. When white women vote for white men, that’s racism. When black men vote for white women, that’s racism and sexism.

When one-legged lesbian Portugese donkeys vote for one-legged lesbian Portugese donkeyes, that’s just spiffing.

Sorry Indy, I’m deadly serious.

Until society holds up male homemaker role models, until our authorities and businesses provide top class childcare facilities, until some scientists stop saying that children are best raised in the home by the mother until school age, then not very much will change. And to me positive discrimination is bare-faced discrimination and not an option.

Until my wife had our child recently, her priority was her career. Now it is our child. That is a natural feeling to her and probably to many women. Until there is a desire to tackle the things I mentioned above, positive discrimination will ensure we produce a less talented bunch of people as they are from a much smaller pool in the first place.

The thing is Andrew that all these kinds of issues – equal status for fathers, better childcare, more family friendly working practices etc – are pretty far down the list in terms of UK and indeed Scottish political priorities and given the economic circumstances will slip down even further.

In contrast the Scandinavian countries are much more advanced than we are on all of those issues and have the lowest gender pay gaps and lowest child poverty levels in the world. These countries all have gender balance mechanisms of one sort or another (and have had for many years) and consequently a much higher number of women in politcal office.

Without that higher representation of women, do you think that the Nordic countries would have adopted these pro-family policies quite so enthusiastically? I tend to doubt it.

It is sometimes mooted that women are less keen on competitions than men are, they have better things to occupy themselves.

Politics is commonly competitive.

Indy, I accept that Norway and Sweden have adopted what is euphemistically called ‘positive action’. But what you are suggesting is that only women can make change to benefit women. My view is a bit more pragmatic. These two countries, but especially Sweden, have been much more progressive in almost every area of politics than the UK, so it is no surprise that they are further ahead of the UK in this area.

I wholly concede that the ideal would be for men and women to be equally represented in whichever walk of life. But I disagree that this outcome should be engineered in any way. As a society, I believe we need to create the conditions for equality, not take short cuts.

I don’t think anyone in any of the Nordic countries talks about positive action euphemistically or otherwise. I think the difference in outlook is that they recognise that equality must be engineered. Creating a more equal society (in whatever context) is an act of will. It doesn’t just happen.

Even if it were possible, and it isn’t, I don’t think anyone would actually want a genuinely equal society. Would they?

What we want is a fair society.

(In an equal society I wouldn’t help a blind person across a road because they would be receiving an unequal share of my social concern.)

Obviously no society can be completely one thing or another. You will never have a completely equal society any more than you will have a completely fair society. That doesn’t mean that you can’t aim to have a more equal or a more fair society.

The difference between equal and fair however is that fair can mean pretty much anything you want it to mean, whereas equal means something a bit more specific.

I could say it is not fair that power has been concentrated for centuries and remains concentrated in the hands of a minority of the population. You could say yes it is fair because everyone has a chance to compete for power, it just so happens that it is white heterosexual men who usually get it. There is nothing unfair therefore about the unequal distribution of power.

It would be a bit of a pointless debate wouldn’t it? Most peoples’ perception of what is fair is subjective.

Equality is a measurement. It has no inherent morality and can be appallingly unfair.

It is often applied simplistically.

Fair is always fair.

sad to read some of this.

Equality before the Law is important, and to aim at universality is a fine social goal.

Equal height, or wealth are unreasonable goals.

But . . . I suspect that some of your posters are looking to Prometheus as a role model.

If you take the point of view that equality is a measurement that has no inherent morality then clearly you will not be in favour of gender balance or indeed any other kind of balance.

But I think you would be in a minority in taking that viewpoint, in Scotland at least. Scottish politicians of all parties I would say aspire to be more like the Scandinavian nations in terms of reducing inequality – Labour, SNP, Lib Dem, Green, possibly even the Tories these days. The fact that the Nordic countries have the lowest child poverty in the world, the lowest gender pay gap, a much lower income gap in general etc these are the goals that we are aiming for. Not getting anywhere near achieving them but that is another matter.

What I find interesting is that while most Scots share the same broad social democratic outlook as the Scandinavians there is this strange resistance towards the gender aspect of it, which is actually fundamental to their systems. It’s as though we can happily accept that government has a duty to reduce income inequality or educational inequality and so on but gender equality is off limits. If I was a cynic I would suggest that this may have something to do with wanting to perpetuate male dominance but I would never be so cynical.

Any road it is clear that there is no agreement to be found.

I would only be in favour of gender balance if it were fair.

Not if it were only equal.