Ask Her to Stand Day
50:50 Parliament celebrated their annual ‘Ask Her To Stand’ event on 18th November in the House of Commons. The 50:50 Parliament movement serves women who are looking to get involved with local or national politics, offering tailored support to get women into positions of authority.
The ‘Ask Her To Stand’ event brought together a panel of cross-party MPs and other feminist voices to discuss equal representation in Parliament and why it matters. With a roster of speakers including Stella Creasy MP, Helen Maguire MP, Mims Davies MP and Melissa Keveren (founder of Girls Who Talk Politics), the evening was lively and optimistic, packed with powerful speeches advocating women’s involvement in politics.
The event formed part of the lead-up to Ask Her to Stand Day, held annually on 21 November to commemorate the passing of the Qualification of Women Act 1918. The groundbreaking legislation first allowed women over 21 to stand for election. Each year, the event – a powerful reminder of how far women’s rights has progressed in the UK – sees leaders from the political sphere and community come together to support the campaign. Because of this, Ask Her to Stand Day is also a crucial reminder of how much work needs to be done to achieve equity in parliament.
The work of 50:50 Parliament
Ultimately, the 50:50 Parliament movement has encouraged more than 3,000 women to sign up through the campaign’s Sign Up to Stand initiative. During the 2024 General Election, 101 women from the community stood to be elected, with 25 winning their constituency seats; and 9,000 members support the charity, with online membership figures reaching 30,000.
During the event, the audience heard from a range of campaigners, 50:50 Parliament ambassadors and spokespeople. 50:50 Parliament CEO Lyanne Nicholl celebrated the success of the movement thus far: “there are a lot of people talking about this”. But she was also keen to emphasise what still needs to happen: that an increased “level of education among the electorate will be crucial for progress”.
Mims Davies: advice to women in politics
Mims Davies MP followed up on her words, insisting that “it is incumbent on all of us to be honest about how resilient we need to be”. She described the peril of reticence on the part of women afraid to push themselves into roles of responsibility – “the most dangerous thing facing us”. More women, she argued, are “saying they don’t want to come forward”; this is something we need to “acknowledge: because that is how progress can come about”.
Mims Davies MP provided advice to women during the early days of their involvement in politics, aiming her words at prospective elective candidates getting used to life in Parliament. The first of her two key tips involved “getting lost!”. She explained that “looking and learning”, exploring your surroundings once you have built up a rhythm and “got into the flow”, will best equip you to achieve, knowing the facilities and connections you have on offer.
Her second piece of wisdom involved engagement in “cross party conversations”. Talking to a diverse range of politicians and case-workers of vastly different backgrounds will provide you with the collaborative discussions so vital for politics – broadening your perspectives, building your network and enriching your political and personal experience.
A “Jurassic” current political climate
“Not only should we be asking her to stand, but we need to ask him to stand aside” ~ Stella Creasy MP.
Stella Creasy MP agreed, with a powerful indictment of the current order: “not only should we be asking her to stand, but we need to ask him to stand aside”. She insisted that “too often we’re being judged by an out-of-date conception of what a politician should look like”. Creasy went on to describe the status quo in Parliament as “jurassic” – women are forced to fight against an atavistic model which is stuck in binary, inflexible modes of thinking about gender and power.
Shakira Akabusi: “Everyone has to start somewhere”
50:50 Parliament ambassador Shakira Akabusi compared women’s fight for political visibility to running: “regardless of speed, stamina and strength, you are a runner: everyone has to start somewhere”. She insisted that Ask Her to Stand “isn’t just for women who are already knowledgeable about politics; it is for every single woman who believes that her voice matters”. Akabusi also drew attention to the damning statistics – that last year’s historic high of 40.5 per cent of female MPs is already waning: “we can not let that momentum slide”.
Hope for continued progress
Ultimately the evening concluded on a positive note, but the abiding message still presents a challenge. With the numbers of women involved in politics dropping, everyone needs to work on creating an environment which nurtures female political talent, instead of intimidating, bullying or harassing them out of positions of responsibility.
In a culture where 2 in 3 young women have experienced sexual harassment, bullying or verbal abuse at work, partly because managers and companies are under increasing levels of pressure, it is no surprise that they are increasingly reluctant to propel themselves forward into positions of responsibility. The work of 50:50 Parliament aims to work with compassion for accessibility, and the Ask Her to Stand event was a hopeful harbinger of change yet to come.
