Anna Melton, Director of In the Works PR
Anna was approached by the Derbyshire Times to contribute to a feature on International Women’s Day and the recent news that Derbyshire County Council’s new cabinet included only two women.
In case you missed it, here’s Anna’s article in full.
‘What is all the fuss about Derbyshire County Council’s new cabinet? Let’s be honest the fact there is one women amongst five men is simply reflective of the UK.
Female MPs make up less than a quarter of the House of Commons, however that proportion is higher than of judges or directors of FTSE 100 companies, but lower than of senior civil servants or Members of the Scottish Parliament and National Assembly for Wales.
Look at the Derbyshire Times own Top 50 influential people – how many of these are women? I’ll save you the trouble of counting, it was six.
Women need to put themselves forward, stand up and be counted. However, we have to be realistic. Many working women are also bringing up families and there simply aren’t enough hours in the day to ‘have it all’.
More often than not it is women who find their career taking a back seat when they have children, either by either dropping their hours to part time, stepping back from promotion opportunities or leaving the work place altogether. It doesn’t makes us any less able or committed in the work place.
Until women cease to become the primary carers for children and there is more financial and practical childcare support available, there will never by a true 50:50 split of power between men and women.
Rather than using International Women’s Day to highlight what women aren’t achieving, let’s look at where we are and what we have achieved as a species since Emmeline Pankhurst campaigned for and won women the vote in 1928.
In less than 100 years women in the UK have achieved freedom of choice. The same careers are open to us and we can be whatever we want to be – whether that’s Prime Minister or full time stay at home mother. Today we have choice and that, ultimately, is what International Women’s Day is about.’
