Hansard

Last weekend, I joined the First Minister and MSP colleagues as we gathered in the chamber to celebrate international women’s day. The event was organised by the Scottish Women’s Convention, and I put on record my thanks for such an enjoyable afternoon. A personal highlight of the day were the contributions from Grace and Zara from Our Lady’s high school in Cumbernauld. The quality of their speeches was outstanding. Grace and Zara are an asset to their school and fantastic role models for other young women. It made me proud, as a Central Scotland MSP, to see the next generation of talent afforded the opportunity to speak in this chamber. I hope that we will see them elected, perhaps to the Scottish Parliament or another chamber, in the future.

I will start my speech by talking about opportunity. After all, the theme of this year’s international women’s day is embrace equity. However, it is crucial that we recognise that we are still living in an unequal country. Despite it being more than 100 years since women first received the vote, we still earn 11 per cent less on average than our male colleagues, run just 4 per cent of Scotland’s top businesses, fill just 13 per cent of senior Police Scotland posts and represent just 6 per cent of Scottish newspaper editors. Our journey towards achieving equality is far from over.

Even with all the progress that has been made by generations of feminists, gender still plays an important role in how we are seen and in the life opportunities that we enjoy in Scotland today. We cannot, in any debate about equality, ignore the inequalities that persist in our society for more than half of the population. It is vital that we continue to strive towards ending those inequalities. As a Parliament, we must be ambitious when looking at the progression of women’s rights and, of course, protecting those rights that have been hard won over the years. We cannot afford to go backwards, and we must continue to ensure that the voices of women are heard and not vilified.

Members on my side of the chamber agree with the premise of the Scottish Government motion, and I associate myself with the First Minister and her calls to end the discrimination, harassment and abuse that women and girls face in our country and around the world.

I will start by looking at some statistics for Scotland. Sexual crimes are at their highest level on record. Domestic abuse incidents are at their second-worst level on record: in 2021-22, there were more than 32,000 charges of domestic abuse in cases that were reported to the Crown Office. Threatening and abusive behaviour offences were recorded as the most common types of offence related to domestic abuse. Only yesterday, we heard of the intimidation and harassment that women receive on public transport. That is not the Scotland that I want my daughter or any young girl to grow up in, and I hope that we can all agree that we can and must do better.

The issue of abuse and discrimination is not isolated to one country. Sadly, it is an all-too-common theme around the world. One newspaper story that I hoped that I would never read was about Mahsa Amini, who was beaten to death by Iranian authorities for not wearing a hijab properly. The Law Enforcement Command of the Islamic Republic of Iran claimed that she had a heart attack at a police station, collapsed and fell into a coma before being transferred to a hospital, but eyewitnesses allege that she was severely beaten and died as a result of police brutality. The case shed renewed light on the country’s treatment of women, with a growing number of female Iranians choosing to flout the law to wear the hijab. I applaud the brave women who have stood up against their oppressors, but I worry about the severe consequences that many will face for doing so.

At times like these, we need to be thankful that, throughout our United Kingdom, we have the right to freedom of speech and expression. In Afghanistan, the Taliban have banned women from attending university, leaving future generations of women unable to choose their futures. In Ukraine, the on-going conflict has severely impacted women and girls. From the bombing of maternity hospitals to human trafficking and gender-based violence, the horrors of war are a daily reality for Ukrainian women.

The violation of women’s rights must stop. We must stand together, always, against those who seek to remove basic human rights from women. I lodged the Scottish Conservatives amendment to highlight the violation of women’s rights globally, and I hope that the Government and Opposition parties will support it at decision time.

I hope that, one day, we will be able to use international women’s day as a cause for celebration because we have achieved equity, rather than a reason to talk about progress and the mountains that we still need to climb.

I want to finish on a positive note, as we are celebrating women today. We have achieved many things together, from the roll-out of free period products across the country to support for the introduction of the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018. We support women best when we work together across political divides and Parliaments. If we are serious about embracing equity, we must continue to do that.

I will finish with this quotation:

“there is always light,
if only we’re brave enough to see it.
If only we’re brave enough to be it.”

I move amendment S6M-08137.2, to insert, after “maintain equality”:

“; expresses disappointment in the backsliding of women’s rights across the world in the past year, and particularly in Iran and Afghanistan”.

[Applause.]