With elections arising in May this 12 months, Holly Dustin offers us a briefing on what the Women’s Equality Party is all about.
Without a doubt, the British political panorama has shifted considerably since I used to be trudging by way of a Politics diploma on the University of Nottingham 25 years in the past. It was, in some methods, an easier time for these of us occupied with who has energy and what they do with it. Margaret Thatcher was nonetheless in workplace (till 1990), and also you had been both for her or towards her. Nelson Mandela was nonetheless in jail on Robben Island and the Cold War dominated geo-politics. You voted in elections and in between time you could possibly make your voice heard by happening a demo or sporting a t-shirt (I did each). There had been no smartphones, no epetitions, no Facebook likes, and undoubtedly no lobbying your MP on twitter.
There had been few ladies in Parliament then and Thatcher, recognized for ‘pulling the ladder up behind her’, solely ever promoted one lady, Baroness Young, to her Cabinet in all eleven years of her premiership. The Politics Department at Nottingham was an all-male affair too (my reminiscence is of a micro-Cold War between the Thatcher supporting majority and Marxist minority). Politics (capital P) was black and white, and didn’t seem to incorporate feminism.
Twenty 5 years later we will say for positive that British politics is much less blokey, although nonetheless too white and male with solely 29% of MPs being ladies and fewer than 7% of MPs being from Black and Minority Ethnic backgrounds, and there’s a new wave of feminist activism each in Parliament and outdoors it. Furthermore, British politics is fragmenting; the three-party system is breaking apart with the collapse of the Lib Dems in Parliament and the rise of Nationalists across the UK. and smaller events, equivalent to UKIP and the Greens, gaining electoral assist even when first-past-the-post signifies that assist doesn’t translate into seats.
WE: the start
Emerging onto this new political terrain is the Women’s Equality Party (or WE as they like), led by journalist Sophie Walker and forming within the blink of a watch from an concept mentioned by her fellow journalist Catherine Mayer and BBC presenter Sandi Toksvig in March 2015 (it was registered with the Electoral Commission by July). A political get together with the only function of advancing ladies’s equality would have been unimaginable to my teenage self and it’s, after all, no coincidence that it has occurred at this juncture of a surge in feminist activism and the breakdown of conventional get together politics. Indeed, UKIP, which has pulled mainstream events to the best on immigration and compelled a referendum on the UK’s membership of the European Union, are always referenced in discussions about WE. Unlike UKIP, WE say they need to be put out of enterprise.
Having been to an early public assembly at London’s Southbank Centre in March 2015, one of many issues that struck me was the identify and framing. It was determined early that it will be the Women’s Equality Party not, for instance, the Feminist Party as in Sweden (Feminist Initiative), and, while the F phrase is used liberally by Walker in media interviews, it’s absent from the official Party blurb. This could also be intentional in an effort to make the Party extra palatable for many who really feel they’ll signal as much as ladies’s equality however not feminism (see current Fawcett analysis on this) and to draw a membership that may probably be drawn from the entire inhabitants. The robust message is that the Party is for each men and women, and that males will profit from a extra equal world for girls (which they’ll, after all, however will even have to surrender their social, financial and political privileges alongside the way in which.)
WE shortly made a splash when it launched, securing media consideration effectively earlier than it had a set of insurance policies. It attracted many 1000’s of members earlier than anybody actually knew what they had been signing as much as past the idea of ‘ladies’s equality’ and ‘extra ladies in parliament’. It already has over 70 native branches throughout the UK and a membership of greater than 45,000 (as of October 2015). This in itself suggests an enormous urge for food for one thing extra inclusive to ladies, much less conventional and fewer alienating than the standard political fare. Hardly stunning when there aren’t any feminine get together leaders sitting within the House of Commons and Westminster politics appears to be like more and more stale and outdated when in comparison with the remainder of the UK, particularly Scotland the place ladies head up the Scottish Government and lead the three largest events.
WE insurance policies
After appreciable work by themed committees, WE launched its insurance policies throughout six areas in October 2015. These are; equal illustration in politics and enterprise, equal pay, equal parenting, equality in schooling, equal remedy of ladies within the media, an finish to violence towards ladies. With violence towards ladies and ladies (VAWG), the world with which I’m most acquainted, there are a number of robust coverage positions, together with scrapping the married couple’s allowance and shifting £800m of financial savings to authorized assist and specialist assist for girls experiencing home and sexual violence. WE has additionally come out in assist of the Nordic mannequin of tackling the harms of prostitution whereby the promoting of intercourse is decriminalised and the shopping for of intercourse is criminalised.
Rightly, WE goals to be ‘transformative’ however it doesn’t but have transformative insurance policies in place. Party leaders have mentioned that its remit is slender and that WE candidates shall be required to enroll to its core insurance policies however free to carry positions on different points. This appears to me to be unsustainable in the long term (and, sadly, I feel we are going to want WE in the long term). In the primary occasion, it’s unhelpful, to not say inaccurate, to ship a message that ladies’s equality is a slender subject, restricted to 6 coverage areas, not least when two of the largest priorities for voters, the financial system and overseas coverage, are usually not amongst the six. Indeed, Walker herself has written coherently about sexual violence in battle and the disproportionate influence on ladies of warfare in relation to Britain’s participation in navy motion in Syria and the refugee disaster in Europe. Likewise, it’s tough to justify not having a complete financial coverage when, a) it’s the authorities’s high precedence and b) the mainstream media and important political events in Westminster routinely overlook the disproportionate influence of austerity measures on ladies and ladies’s poverty that means that WE might have an actual affect within the debate right here.
Secondly, the positions of candidates on different coverage areas may effectively battle with the Party’s core insurance policies. For instance, immigration, additionally a high concern for voters, isn’t one in all WE’s six coverage areas and but immigration coverage has an actual influence on the security and equality of migrant and refugee ladies within the UK (and outdoors it). A WE candidate might conceivably discover themselves within the place of supporting sure immigration insurance policies that conflicted with WE coverage and goals.
The policy-making course of itself raised points for me. Whilst there was a laudable intent to create coverage from the grassroots up, such consultations have after all been carried out by different events for a few years so there’s a threat of reinventing the wheel. For instance, in relation to violence towards ladies and ladies, consultants within the sector labored collectively for years to safe a cross party-commitment to a VAWG technique in Westminster which the then Labour Government revealed in 2009. This was adopted by the Coalition Government publishing its personal Strategy in 2010 and a refreshed technique is promised by the present Conservative Government this 12 months. At a time when baby sexual abuse and exploitation dominates the information headlines, this work continues to be championed by the Home Secretary and there may be appreciable engagement with the sector. The Strategy is much from excellent, however I’d have most well-liked to see WE evaluate and seek the advice of upon what’s already in place and work with consultants and specialist ladies’s providers to enhance it. Starting from scratch risked showing to erase the laborious work of the ladies’s sector, and certainly ladies in different events, in getting authorities and different events to the place they’re. Hardly the collaborative strategy WE espouse.
The Party has mentioned that it needs to enchantment throughout the political spectrum and that it’s non-partisan however I’m not fairly positive what this implies in follow aside from it doesn’t settle for the labels ‘left’ or ‘proper’; mainstream events are usually fairly pleased to welcome defectors from different events, and WE themselves have already proven that they aren’t above taking a well-deserved pop at different events (see, for instance, Walker’s astute dismissal of Jeremy Corbyn’s consideration of women- solely prepare carriages to take care of sexual harassment).
Furthermore, while Party leaders persistently say that illustration in politics issues and has an influence, the dominant picture we’ve got by way of the mainstream media (it might be completely different at conferences) is of a extremely smart, however narrowly drawn group of ladies. The Party shall be aware that it is going to be beneath the highlight on variety, notably now as it’s deciding on its candidates for elections this May for the London Mayor, London and Welsh Assemblies and Scottish Parliament.
These are all critical points for the Party to deal with. However, once I take a look at the stability sheet I can’t assist however suppose that WE is, general, a fairly good factor, particularly in a macho Westminster context. On the plus aspect, WE are very media savvy, as you’ll count on. Walker, Toksvig and Mayer are recurrently quoted and interviewed, Walker specifically has commented on a spread of topics from the ‘tampon tax’ to the proposed removing of feminism from the varsity syllabus. The web site is interesting and social media exercise is participating, together with from native branches which sprang up with spectacular velocity. Bearing in thoughts that solely 1 / 4 of candidates who ran within the General Election in 2015 had been ladies, WE’s utility course of for turning into a candidate on this May’s elections appeared refreshingly accessible and welcoming, and included 4 days of free childcare.
What can WE do?
WE have been criticised for specializing in ladies’s illustration as an finish in itself (it helps quotas for the subsequent two General Elections to herald in 50/50 illustration within the House of Commons). I feel this criticism is misplaced. If WE can assist safe concrete shifts within the political illustration of ladies of all backgrounds and quick ahead us to a time when the insults ‘Blair’s Babes’ and ‘Cameron’s Cuties’ are now not misogynistic forex it is going to have been value it in my ebook. In truth, we all know from previous expertise that considerably elevated numbers of ladies has a direct influence on legislation and policy-making. When Labour used all-women-shortlists for the 1997 General Election there was an enormous enhance in ladies MPs, principally Labour, and there adopted a raft of insurance policies on points starting from home violence and childcare to equality laws.
Of course, with out quotas, our First-past-the-post system for elections to the House of Commons is a barrier to WE profitable seats however it’s certainly not not possible, as some argue, that one or two excessive profile candidates may win seats in 2020 if they’ve made progress in electoral assist between at times? And, as Caroline Lucas has proven for the Greens, one excessive profile MP can safe a variety of consideration for the Party. The criticism that WE will cut up the progressive vote if they aim seats the place the sitting candidate doesn’t assist ladies’s equality is clearly a threat, particularly in Westminster elections, however as WE say, no one owns the votes of progressives.
I additionally imagine that WE might have a strategic position in setting the usual for different events on particular points, because it has on tackling the harms of the prostitution trade the place its assist of the Nordic mannequin sends a robust message about the necessity to completely rework gender relations together with ending males’s proper to purchase ladies’s our bodies. It is a controversial coverage although and spokespeople will must be assured in making connections with different areas of inequality together with poverty, racism and sexualized sexism within the media. Likewise, WE will must be astute within the positions it takes and arguments it makes about discrimination, harassment and violence in direction of trans men and women. These are necessary points however they’re at the moment vulnerable to being subsumed by requires adjustments in equality legal guidelines and insurance policies which might threaten specialist ladies’s assist providers and undermine monitoring of intercourse discrimination. It is a rocky time for feminist politics and debate with deep splits on these more and more dominant points and WE’s strategy shall be essential.
Britain has not had a feminine Prime Minister since 1990 and there has by no means been a everlasting feminine chief of the Labour Party. The present Conservative and Labour leaders in Westminster are unable to shake off the notion that they battle with ladies’s equality and limitless scandals attest to a deeply ingrained tradition of sexism throughout the political spectrum. It is a shameful state of affairs to be in within the 21st century.
So while we debate WE’s politics, whether or not to affix and form it from the within, problem from the surface, and even be impressed by it to arrange our personal feminist get together, I imagine that WE has an actual contribution to make each to British politics and to ladies’s equality in Britain.
Holly Dustin is former Director of the End Violence Against Women Coalition and co-Founder of the Centre for Gender Equal Media. @HDbrighton
Catherine Mayer of WE responds….
Dear Holly,
I’ve intently learn your piece on the Women’s Equality Party in an effort to provide the considerate response your personal thoughtfulness deserves. You and I agree on a lot, not least on the pressing want for this get together. One of our founding goals is to galvanise older events into recognising and fixing their very own failings on gender equality. In the identical spirit I’m pleased to be taught from you—and there’s a lot to be taught. There’s nothing like doing politics for actual to grasp the large obstacles to transformational politics. The prices of politics are ludicrous and anti-democratic; the forms is stultifying; the electoral system is designed for stability however as an alternative does a very good job of blocking change.
In spite of that, as you level out, the Women’s Equality Party continues to develop and flourish. WE are working candidates within the London mayoral and GLA elections, and for the Welsh Assembly and Scottish Parliament. WE have 45,000 members and supporters and greater than 70 branches, all of this from an impulse lower than a 12 months in the past, on March 2 2015, once I stood up on the WOW Festival and mentioned perhaps a ladies’s equality get together was wanted.
That’s the identify I used proper from the outset, and the identify we debated on the very first assembly you attended later the identical month. As you’ll keep in mind, fairly a number of folks argued we should always drop the phrase “ladies” in an effort to widen our enchantment. Others argued we should always drop the phrase “ladies” as a result of they imagine gender equality can solely be achieved in lockstep with different types of equality, by dismantling all present energy constructions.
You make the purpose that we don’t name ourselves a “feminist” get together. I’m a feminist. You’re additionally right that WE imagine males important to reaching gender equality. WE want males—their votes, their cash (please!), and sure, their views. WE purpose to be inclusive and numerous as a celebration and a motion, not simply to advocate for inclusivity and variety. Yet if a worry of alienating males had guided our choice to not name the get together “feminist”, I’d even have shied away from the phrase “ladies”. I’m assured that WE will resonate with males—and males are becoming a member of in substantial numbers—as a result of gender equality is best for the overwhelming majority of males than the present established order. You point out that gender equality means males have “to surrender their social, financial and political privileges”, however extra gender equal nations have decrease charges of despair and divorce, greater charges of well-being and revel in enhanced financial progress.
The purpose we’re referred to as the Women’s Equality Party is as a result of ladies are a bit over half the world’s inhabitants and but nowhere on the planet are we on an equal footing to males. It appeared to me from the start because it does now that the identify of the get together ought to proclaim unapologetically and unequivocally our overarching purpose. It’s not simply that “equality” is just too enormous a time period to keep away from ruckuses about whose equality we’d imply. It’s not simply that there are already events of the left making the broader argument for equality—whereas usually doing too little to follow what they preach inside their very own events. If solely I had £1 for each lady I’ve seen undervalued and neglected by so-called progressives, or informed to get within the queue behind different “curiosity teams”… I’d give it straight to WE.
I’m an intersectional feminist and have at all times been of the left, however I way back misplaced religion within the events of the left to ship gender equality with out exterior assist—or strain—to pay attention minds. I additionally don’t imagine the left completely owns gender equality or can ship it with out assist of the centre and centre proper. When I conceived the Women’s Equality Party as a non-partisan get together, I freely admit that I used to be considering to some extent in strategic phrases. Just as we’d like males to vote for change, so we’d like the broadest spectrum of assist doable. I made efforts from the begin to construct political variety into the organisation together with other forms of variety. But the get together mannequin additionally mirrored my rising conviction that pressing motion was wanted to re-engage the individuals who voted on the final election whereas holding their noses, turned off by all of the political events, or who selected populist events not as a result of they actually supported them however to protest, or who didn’t vote in any respect. Nine million ladies and eight million males stayed house on the normal election final 12 months.
These folks had been turned off by the sense that not one of the events represented them. They had been turned off by the political tradition that put get together pursuits and, in David Cameron’s phrase “Punch and Judy politics”, earlier than nationwide pursuits—and also you and I each know that enhancing gender equality couldn’t be extra firmly within the nationwide curiosity. They had been turned off by seeing events pay lip service to selling ladies—all the principle events are in principle signed as much as gender equality—however one way or the other not fairly managing to take action. These folks, switched off by conventional politics, have fuelled the expansion of WE. Although lots of our members are additionally members of the older events, the largest single group are common voters who’ve by no means earlier than felt moved to affix a political get together.
You fear that our mannequin is unsustainable and that our insurance policies are usually not sufficiently transformational, as a result of in your view creating a celebration round six core aims (equal illustration, equal pay, shared parenting and caregiving, equal schooling, equal remedy by and within the media and an finish to violence towards ladies and ladies) is just too slender. Well I don’t suppose the get together would now be thriving as it’s if we lacked readability and focus. The older events have competing priorities and gender equality too usually takes a backseat.
At the identical time I dispute that ours is a slender remit. On the opposite, every of these six aims covers enormous and interlocking areas of coverage, foremost amongst them the financial system, well being and an internationalist outlook. WE’ve approached the migration debate in a approach that highlights the vulnerability of feminine migrants, too usually ignored within the clamour. The place to begin for any financial debate is the disparity that sees ladies on common poorer than males, in decrease paid jobs if employed, finishing up way more unpaid caregiving work and subsequently extra susceptible than males to a tightening of public funds. These are realities all the large events recurrently ignore.
Our first coverage doc, revealed in October, not even three full months after we registered with the Electoral Commission, accommodates sensible insurance policies to repair these imbalances that every one the large events ought to be capable to signal as much as. Most of them don’t even value something or are funded by higher deploying present budgets. Policies are transformational provided that carried out.
The doc is an amazingly robust piece of labor due to your enter and the enter of many different folks such as you who helped funnel time and experience into formulating the insurance policies. It was to keep away from reinventing the wheel that we consulted as extensively as we did—and certainly took on board the prevailing VAWG methods of different events and organisations. But WE purpose to be a discussion board for voices that discover it laborious to make themselves heard in conventional political cultures so we additionally reached out to our activists and requested them to succeed in out additional nonetheless.
It was notably necessary to do that as a result of we’re so new. The core group that obtained this factor up and working needed to construct constructions for inside democracy after which adapt them and adapt them once more to maintain up with the loopy velocity of the get together’s progress, from kitchen desk to full-on campaigning organisation. WE are trying ahead to holding our first get together convention later this 12 months and to ever-more collaborative decision-making taking in an ever-wider vary of views and experiences. Our members will finally resolve our insurance policies and the scope of our remit.
In deciding on our candidates for the May elections we not solely deployed the knowledge of our branches within the shortlisting course of but in addition enabled members to resolve the end result in a free vote. The turnout was very excessive certainly. And as you’ll have seen, we now have an exceptionally robust checklist of candidates. That checklist can be pleasingly numerous although there are some protected classes that we’d need to see higher represented in future elections. We wished to take constructive motion to make sure variety and found that the legal guidelines to guard towards discrimination additionally prohibit a brand new get together equivalent to ourselves from doing so. However that checklist goes some technique to answering your concern that the get together is shaped by “a narrowly drawn group of ladies”. WE have labored and can proceed to work very laborious to broaden and open and prolong, to all backgrounds and financial teams. The hardest to succeed in are these most in want of being reached—and listened to—folks working a number of poorly paid jobs in an effort to survive, and individuals who don’t have any work in any respect, people who find themselves marginalised, exhausted and excluded.
Incidentally I’m not shocked that you just assumed WE to be a little bit of a clique. The assembly you attended in March 2015, a number of weeks after I first proposed the thought of the get together, drew closely on my private networks, although it did appeal to you and fairly a number of different individuals I didn’t but know. WE needed to begin someplace. The entire factor was organised by way of a Facebook web page I arrange with none agency expectations that anybody in any respect would come. As you’ll recall, about 250 folks crowded into the room.
The purpose the Women’s Equality Party has grown so quick and diversified far, far past my pals and pals of pals and their networks is that WE communicate to a conviction, a ardour, an impatience: to get on with making gender equality a actuality. You and I share that conviction, ardour and impatience. I vastly admire your assist and recommendation and I stay up for persevering with the talk.
Yours in gratitude,
Catherine
Catherine Mayer is a journalist and one of many co-founders of the Women’s Equality Party. @catherine_mayer