Meeting of the Parliament 03 March 2020
Emma Harper makes an important point. The women in agriculture task force sends a positive message to women in rural areas and I very much welcomed its report, which showed the significant barriers that women face and which I just highlighted.
As I have said before in the chamber, the Scottish Government should make further, targeted interventions to improve rural childcare. We learned today that a major recruitment drive is needed to ensure that the expansion in funded nursery places will meet its summer deadline. The issue is serious and has a serious impact on people who live in rural communities.
In rural areas, our local colleges are important to education, given that universities are often located further away and are not necessarily the right place for some people who want to study part time. I would like more change in the gender balance in important subject areas in Scottish colleges. In 2016, the Scottish Funding Council committed to increase increasing the minority gender share in the most imbalanced subjects, with the aim of ensuring that the imbalance is no greater than 75:25 by 2030. However, Audit Scotland said in its report, “Scotland’s colleges 2019”:
“Progress towards addressing the long-standing gender imbalances has been limited and will require a concerted effort from schools, colleges and wider society in making sustainable change”.
I ask the minister to say, in her closing speech, how the Scottish Government intends to address such issues and encourage more girls to take up science, technology, engineering and mathematics subjects, particularly in the context of agriculture.
I am sure that I speak on behalf of my female colleagues across the parties in the Parliament when I say that we must root out discrimination and harassment in our society, especially that which is directed at women, whether it happens in the rural or the urban sphere. Online abuse is a major part of the issue and, I think, is putting a large section of young women off thinking of running for office. In my four years as an elected member, I have experienced multiple instances of misogynistic abuse—indeed, veiled threats, too. I am sure that many of us have experienced such abuse. Even though it is 100 years since women were given the right to vote and we have had two female Prime Ministers, there are people who treat democratically elected women with disdain. That sends a very negative message to young women and girls who wish to run for public office or who have aspirations of operating at a high level in a company.
Women’s political representation and workplace equality were discussed in the Scottish Human Rights Commission’s progress report to the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, in which the SHRC considered Scotland’s position in the context of women’s rights. The report highlighted that there is room for improvement, as we all know. Scotland led the way on political representation for women but dropped from fourth place on the global stage in 2003 to 27th place in 2017.
We need to do more to convince women that their place can be here in the Parliament. I thank the people in my party for their work in Women2win—a fantastic movement that encourages, mentors, trains and provides networking opportunities for young women. Through Nosheena Mobarik and our diversity commission, the Scottish Conservatives are leading the way in increasing the number of female black and minority ethnic candidates. We have a long way to go. Only 19 per cent of Conservative MSPs are women, and overall only 35 per cent of MSPs are women.
I will finish with a quote from Jenni Murray’s novel:
“A woman who has education, passion and, as is the case for so many, a father who supports his sons and daughters in absolutely equal measure, can achieve what she believes is right, just as a man can.”
I want women and girls, no matter who or where they are, to draw inspiration from that and realise that the sky is the limit.
15:25