Less Barmy Army, more Barmy Harmy

I've taken a week to comment on Harriet Harman's comments regarding male leadership of the Labour party in particular and the country in general.

For those of you who may have missed them, here's what the Deputy Leader of the Labour Party had to say last Sunday:

“I don’t agree with all-male leaderships.”

“Men cannot be left to run things on their own. I think it’s a thoroughly bad thing to have a men-only leadership.”

“In a country where women regard themselves as equal, they are not prepared to see men running the show themselves.”

“I think a balanced team of men and women makes better decisions. That’s one of the reasons why I was prepared to run for deputy leader.”

Those comments are - verbatim - what she said, paraphrased by The Times as "You can't trust men in power."

Now others, including the mighty Iain Dale and the less-mighty-but-still-quite-mighty SNP Tactical Voting have taken her comments to task and are worth reading (if only because my attempted critique will fall short of their high standards). However, I'm commenting anyway, because Harman's comments made me think of something interesting.

It made me wonder whether she remembered a certain election in November 2008. No, not the one that Gordon was too scared to hold. The other one - the one on the other side of the Atlantic, the one that made headlines across the world, the one that "The One" won. I seem to remember that a woman contested that election (albeit not at the top of the ticket) but did not win.

What is your point, you ask? Well merely that here was an opportunity for the American public to do what Harriet Harman thinks we should do here - namely appoint a woman to one of the two top posts in the country - and they did not.

Now I know there were other factors at play (Sarah Palin's views on religion, guns, her view of Russia - from her house - and various other things didn't make her a strong candidate, not to mention the candidature of "The One" on the opposing side) but it would strike me as odd that Harriet Harman would not support a woman standing in an election against a man given what she has just said about men in power. In this Question Time clip she says just that: she would not have voted for Palin if she could - she would have voted against her - which, at that point in the campaign would have meant voting for a man.

At the time John McCain picked Sarah Palin as his running mate, I thought it was a terrific choice - spoke to the conservative base, executive experience as a governor, maybe attract the female vote that Clinton seemed to have tied up for Obama - but that was before we got an opportunity to scrutinise her politics up close. Indeed, I remember remarking to a colleague at the time that this was an opportunity for women to get one of their own elected to the White House - a heartbeat from the Presidency - and she laughed at me. She asked if I honestly expected women to look beyond her politics and vote for her simply because she was a woman.

At the time I can honestly say I had thought so, yes. I mean, if women do actually think like Harriet Harman (and, let's be honest, it's tough to know what women think at the best of times!) and expect that one of the two top offices in the land should be held by a woman, then yes, they should probably vote for her on that basis.

However, with more experience of politics and a recognition that what/who a person is does not necessarily shape their political views, I'd be mortified if someone thought I voted for someone simply because they were a straight, white, Celtic-supporting, Protestant (I know - bizarre eh?), able-bodied male. The offence that my colleague took to my indication that if she thought there should be more women should be in politics she should vote for the ones that do stand (ie - Palin) regardless of their politics was warranted.

Politics is about making an informed decision about a candidate based on what you know about their politics and whether you think they could do the job better than the other candidates. That's it for me. Nothing to do with their gender, religion, sexuality, whether they can walk or not. And yes, I do realise that we have a significant under-representation - particularly of women - in politics, as I've discussed before. And yes I think something needs to be done about it. But handing something over on a plate without earning it? Well, as the Barmy Army would say, that's just not cricket.

Don't ask me what Barmy Harmy might say.

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More on All Women Shortlists

After my piece a couple of days ago about the race to replace John Reid as Labour candidate for Airdrie & Shotts, something resembling an actual debate has taken place in the blogosphere.

Yousuf gets the ball rolling by defending All-Woman Shortlists.

Will says they shouldn't be necessary.

Jeff takes the plunge and says how ridiculous AWS are - and incurs the wrath of... well, just about everyone. He also doesn't think there needs to be gender equality in politics - a view somewhat out of sync with political correctness.

Will responds, taking on the wider issue of female representation in politics and questions the democratic nature of AWS.

And Kezia takes Will & Jeff to task for "misjudged wisdom."

All in all, a fairly interesting discussion.

I'd like to point out that my original point was similar to Will's - not that it was made in anything like as eloquent a manner. I don't think AWS should be necessary (though the Hansard Society seems to think it is) and I think good female MPs/MSPs can be elected without the system in place.

But my original question has still not been answered in any meaningful fashion by anyone contributing to the debate. If we agree (and I know Jeff doesn't) that there needs to be more opportunities for women to enter politics, how can we do that that without resorting to the "political gerrymandering" that is AWS if we think it is fundamentally undemocratic?

Any ideas?

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Replacing the Doctor

No, don't worry Tom Harris, not that one. This one.

Brian Taylor has a great piece about the internal competition to replace John Reid as Labour's Westminster Parliamentary candidate for Airdrie & Shotts at the next election - and the wrangling over a potential all-female shortlist for the seat. Kezia Dugdale made her feelings on the issue of female representation clear last week while it is an issue I have written about before.

So here's the story so far. John Reid, now Chairman of Celtic, has decided he's had enough Cabinet positions to last a lifetime and will retire from the House of Commons at the next election. Labour's National Executive has "ordered" the local party to draw up an all-female shortlist of candidates. This hasn't gone down too well with the local party, whose preferred candidate is Airdrie councillor Jim Logue. But, with the National Executive having the power to close the branch if they do not toe the line, there may be fireworks ahead.

I don't think it will come to that... but there is a serious point from this story (well, more than one - but I'll ignore the power structures of political parties for the moment). What lengths should political parties resort to in order to see more women represented in politics?

Labour (and, to an extent, the Lib Dems) have been the most proactive in this respect - zipping their European lists with alternative male/ female candidates, twinning constituencies and, as discussed above, forcing all female shortlists onto - sometimes unwilling - branches. Others (the SNP and the Tories I think) do not have any formal structures in place to encourage female representation, preferring (again, I think) to let their members decide who should be their representatives in elections - male or female - and expecting that whoever gets the nod will be the best person for the job, irrespective of their gender.

Now, I'm not a huge fan of "affirmative action" when it prevents a better qualified candidate from getting a job. On the whole, if there are two candidates who are equally well qualified, equally well suited to the job, have interviewed well etc and you can't separate them, then maybe you pick the person who would diversify your staff. Which is, I think, how it is supposed to work. I don't know, maybe that's why I can't get a job - being a young, white male...

However, I do recognise this is as an issue in politics. After the sad death of Bashir Ahmed MSP, the Scottish Parliament lost its only MSP from an ethnic minority. 129 white faces now sit in the chamber, although with the election of Anne McLaughlin in his place, there are now 45 female MSPs (34.8%) of the total. There are also 34 Scottish constituencies for the UK Parliament that have never had a female MP represent that constituency.

How do we encourage more female - and ethnic minority - representation in politics? And how do we do it in a way that doesn't look like it is undemocratic?

I expect there are several answers to that, answers that some might find more appealing than others. But I think it comes down to whether we, as a society, want to challenge the predominant trend of politics being a man's world. Because until we do, women will remain a minority within the political world. And that isn't right.

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