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‘Stand by your man’: Women's political recruitment at the 2010 UK general election

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British Politics Aims and scope

Abstract

The year 2010 constituted a favourable opportunity for the greater descriptive representation of women in the UK Parliament. The parties were publicly competing over the issue; Parliament had its own Committee looking at it; and there were plenty of vacancies for candidates in each of the parties’ held seats, as many more MPs than usual stood down. The outcome was disappointing. There was an overall increase in the number of women MPs – up from 128 to 142 – but this was only a 2.5 per cent increase on 2005. Inter-party differences remain. The Liberal Democrats witnessed a decline in the number and percentage of their women MPs and candidates; the Tories saw a doubling of their number, with women now constituting 16 per cent of their parliamentary party; and Labour has both the largest number and percentage of women MPs. These patterns are best explained by the parties’ different attitudes towards equality guarantees – measures that, all other things being equal, return women MPs to Parliament. In other words, Labour's All Women Shortlists once again delivered. The other parties’ efforts were simply less efficient at translating women candidates into MPs. Looking to the future, the picture is far from rosy. The Coalition's plans for political reform will likely increase competition for selection at the next general election to women's detriment, and the impact of the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority raises the possibility that their supply might decrease too.

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Notes

  1. This excludes Anne McIntosh, whose election was delayed by the death of one of the other candidates during the election campaign – she was elected some three weeks later.

  2. http://www.ipu.org/wmn-e/classif.htm, accessed 27 June 2010.

  3. Note this excludes Andrew Pelling MP, Croydon Central, who re-stood but as an Independent rather than Conservative, but includes Clare Short and Bob Waring in the Labour figures and Quentin Davies, Derek Conway and Bob Spink in the Conservative figures.

  4. Daily Mail, 4 August 2009.

  5. See, for example Lib Dem News, 20 June 2008.

  6. It might also be considered an example of equality rhetoric, signalling to aspirant candidates and the grassroots that women's representation was being taken seriously.

  7. Liberal Democrats – Reports to Conference (spring 2010), available at http://www.libdems.org.uk/siteFiles/resources/PDF/conference/Birmingham%20reports%202010%20PLAIN%20TEXT.txt.

  8. Shortlisting quotas have been party policy since the inception of the SDP (Coote and Patullo, 1990).

  9. See, for instance, Nick Clegg's evidence to the Speaker's Conference.

  10. Julia Goldsworthy: ‘I have changed my mind on all women shortlists … the Lib Dems now have fewer women MPs … that's not acceptable’ (Cornish Guardian, 7 June 2010).

  11. This section draws extensively on Childs and Webb (2011).

  12. If party activists did not want to lose this power they could voluntarily adopt an AWS.

  13. See Kenney (2009) for a discussion of ‘localness’ and Labour candidates in Scotland.

  14. Snowdon (2010) argues that Steve Hilton, Cameron's Director of Strategy, advised him to hold out.

  15. Subsequent research will need to be undertaken to establish this.

  16. The Totnes primary cost some £40 000 (Guardian, 4 August 2009).

  17. See Labour Women's Network, http://www.labour.org.uk/women/labour_women.

  18. http://www2.labour.org.uk/ray-collins-speech-conference,2009-09-27.

  19. The Guardian, 5 April 2010.

  20. Speaker's Conference (2010, p. 16).

  21. Internal Labour party document.

  22. Tribune, 15 November 2009.

  23. In selections for the 2005 general election and those that took place before January 2010 the CLPs with retiring MPs could ‘volunteer’ as AWS; if too few volunteered before the set deadline the NEC designated AWS seats.

  24. This was suspected in Airdrie and Ashfield. http://petergkenyon.typepad.com/peterkenyon/2010/02/has-labour-scrapped-all-women-shortlists-in-wales.html.

  25. Here, a seat is classified as a retirement seat if the 2005 notional results for the new seat put the incumbent, but retiring, MP, in the winning place. This is in line with what Labour meant by a retirement seat and is hence a better test of AWS because it excludes seats that Labour would not have won in 2005.

  26. For example, Pontypridd (11, 428 majority); Islwyn (16, 787 majority); and Erdington (10 000+ majority), were all designated as open seats.

  27. http://petergkenyon.typepad.com/peterkenyon/2010/02/has-labour-scrapped-all-women-shortlists-in-wales.html.

  28. Harriet Harman could not get agreement to include BME shortlists in the Equality Bill; Labour's response to the Speaker's Conference recommendation for permissive BME shortlist legislation noted that, ‘whilst we think more needs to be done, there is no consensus amongst our BAME activists, nor the wider BAME community, that all-BAME shortlists are the best way to address this underrepresentation’ (Speaker's Conference, 2010, Appendix 4, 20). Note, the Labour party uses the term BAME in preference to BME.

  29. In 2010 there were 11 seats where a woman was guaranteed to be returned as all candidates for the three main parties were female (Hornchurch and Upminster; Mitcham and Morden; Brighton Pavillion; Lewisham Deptford; Epping Forest; Bolton West; Glasgow North; Islington Sth; Solihul; Truro and Falmouth; Cardiff Central); for men this was true in 267 seats.

  30. Cf. Sunday Times (26 July 2009) which reports that the ‘team promoting female candidates’ are focused on the selection of more women as replacements for expenses scandal retirees.

  31. Coalition Agreement (2010, p. 27) http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/media/409088/pfg_coalition.pdf, accessed 20 May 2010.

  32. The IPSA was created by the Parliamentary Standards Act (PSA) in 2009. See http://www.ipsa-home.org.uk/faqs.html.

  33. Hansard Society, http://mpexpensesconsultation.org.uk/responses/.

  34. Guardian, 19 February 2010.

  35. Women's Parliamentary Labour Party, http://mpexpensesconsultation.org.uk/responses/.

  36. Note this position is also taken by the WPLP (IOS, 8 November 2009).

  37. See http://www.ipsa-home.org.uk/EqualiytandImpact.html; Unlock Democracy, http://mpexpensesconsultation.org.uk/responses/.

  38. Women's Parliamentary Labour Party, http://mpexpensesconsultation.org.uk/responses/.

  39. Consultation on Amendments to the MPs’ Expenses Scheme Rules, June 2010, http://www.ipsa-home.org.uk/Publications.html#.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Politics and Sociology Birkbeck, University of London, Malet Street, Bloomsbury, London, WC1E 7HX, UK

    Jeanette Ashe & Rosie Campbell

  2. Sociology, Politics and International Studies, University of Bristol, 4 Priory Road, Bristol, BS8 1TY, UK

    Sarah Childs

  3. Department of Politics and International Relations, Kingston University, KT1 2EE, UK

    Elizabeth Evans

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  1. Jeanette Ashe
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  2. Rosie Campbell
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  3. Sarah Childs
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  4. Elizabeth Evans
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Correspondence to Sarah Childs.

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Ashe, J., Campbell, R., Childs, S. et al. ‘Stand by your man’: Women's political recruitment at the 2010 UK general election. Br Polit 5, 455–480 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1057/bp.2010.17

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