Joan Frank\'s Blog Site

Step Forward the Women of Brighton

Brighton Short Breaks welcomes Brighton and Hove demonstrating its as the most Right On in the United Kingdomthis week with the occurance that it is the first time  a parliamentary election has witnessed an all-female listing of campaigners.

20 years after Mrs Thatcher broke governmental ground  by being elected  the first ever woman Prime Minister the charge that the vestibules of Westminster are still a masculine mastered area  ring just as clamorously as ever! So, Brighton and Hove’s totally female  short list of Parliamentary candidates feeds some boost to a possible future shift of base in the sex equalizer in the political power domain .

Being quoted in The Argus , Fawcett Society chief executive Ceri Goddard said: “If all the candidates are women that is cause for celebration but also concern that it has taken until 2009, whereas all-male elections are still the norm.

“The voters if Brighton can be pleased that whom ever they elect they will be a step closer to closing the gender gap in parliament where currently less than 20% of our MP’s are women – less than Iraq, Afghanistan and Rwanda.”

‘Less than Iraq, Afghanistan and Rwanda……… ‘ – personally that particular statement left me somewhat abashed about the state of our political domain and questioning as to the reasons for male domination above and beyond the prehistoric precedency that gentlemen should have it totally their own way – and its a whole Pandoras box of discussion that is healthiest left for another place .

But my role here today is as – as always – to fly the flag for Brighton and Hove and demonstrate how innovative thinking and politically conscious our town is, and having  a ratio of men to women in parliament  more symbolic of the population, is in my judgment, a pace in the right direction!