The publication yesterday of a report looking at women’s contribution to the UK economy is a welcome addition to the large body of evidence that business needs more women – at all levels.
The Women Business Council’s report to Government found that if women participated in the workforce to the same degree as men, the UK could increase its GDP by 0.5% per year, with potential gains of 10% by 2030. Some 2.4m women not in work currently want to work.
Key recommendations include broadening girls’ aspirations and career choices by getting schools to partner with careers advisers, business and parents, and getting business to embrace the benefits of flexible working.
What is also needed are good role models, starting from the top in company boards to encourage women lower down the ‘pipeline’. But the UK’s high profile attempts to increase the number of women on boards aren’t working. As the latest Cranfield School of Management research shows, not only have the numbers of women on boards not increased but the rate has slowed. Cranfield believes it’s because firms have “become complacent about the issue”. So the European Commission’s proposal to increase female board representation to 40% is not only welcome but necessary.
I cannot see how females can participate in the workforce, or indeed society as a whole, against a backdrop where they are portrayed and referred to in such terms of contempt by the mass male media otherwise known as porn. Wholesale media discrimination undermines our status as equal human beings in every facet of society, from equal access to education, safety in our own homes, equality with our male siblings right through to equal treatment in the workforce. The government seems to not understand this basic fundamental principle of equality and of human behaviour and until it legislates against promoting gender hatred in the media then all other legislation is simply slamming shut the stable door long after the horse has bolted.