Vol. 757 Wednesday No. 64 26 November 2014 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES (HANSARD) HOUSE OF LORDS OFFICIAL REPORT ORDER OF BUSINESS Questions Employment: Gender Equality .....................................................................................881 Mental Health Services.................................................................................................883 Income and Wealth Inequality.....................................................................................886 Divorce: Effect on Children .........................................................................................888 Pension Schemes Bill First Reading..................................................................................................................890 Consumer Rights Bill Report (3rd Day)..........................................................................................................890 Houses of Parliament: World Heritage Site Question for Short Debate............................................................................................962 Consumer Rights Bill Report (3rd Day) (Continued) ....................................................................................976 Grand Committee First World War: Commemorations Question for Short Debate ....................................................................................GC 273 Electoral Registration Question for Short Debate ....................................................................................GC 288 India Question for Short Debate ....................................................................................GC 301 Flood Defences Question for Short Debate ....................................................................................GC 316 NHS: Health Improvement Question for Short Debate ....................................................................................GC 332 Written Statements......................................................................................................WS 37 Written Answers .........................................................................................................WA 173 £4·00 Lords wishing to be supplied with these Daily Reports should give notice to this effect to the Printed Paper Office. No proofs of Daily Reports are provided. Corrections for the bound volume which Lords wish to suggest to the report of their speeches should be clearly indicated in a copy of the Daily Report, which, with the column numbers concerned shown on the front cover, should be sent to the Editor of Debates, House of Lords, within 14 days of the date of the Daily Report. This issue of the Official Report is also available on the Internet at www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201415/ldhansrd/index/141126.html PRICES AND SUBSCRIPTION RATES DAILY PARTS Single copies: Commons, £5; Lords £4 Annual subscriptions: Commons, £865; Lords £600 LORDS VOLUME INDEX obtainable on standing order only. Details available on request. BOUND VOLUMES OF DEBATES are issued periodically during the session. Single copies: Commons, £105; Lords, £60 (£100 for a two-volume edition). Standing orders will be accepted. THE INDEX to each Bound Volume of House of Commons Debates is published separately at £9·00 and can be supplied to standing order. All prices are inclusive of postage. The first time a Member speaks to a new piece of parliamentary business, the following abbreviations are used to show their party affiliation: Abbreviation Party/Group CB Cross Bench Con Conservative Con Ind Conservative Independent DUP Democratic Unionist Party GP Green Party Ind Lab Independent Labour Ind LD Independent Liberal Democrat Ind SD Independent Social Democrat Lab Labour Lab Ind Labour Independent LD Liberal Democrat LD Ind Liberal Democrat Independent Non-afl Non-affiliated PC Plaid Cymru UKIP UK Independence Party UUP Ulster Unionist Party No party affiliation is given for Members serving the House in a formal capacity, the Lords spiritual, Members on leave of absence or Members who are otherwise disqualified from sitting in the House. © Parliamentary Copyright House of Lords 2014, this publication may be reproduced under the terms of the Open Parliament licence, which is published at www.parliament.uk/site-information/copyright/. 881 Employment: Gender Equality[26 NOVEMBER 2014] Employment: Gender Equality 882 100 companies at all levels for women? Also, has the House of Lords number of women ambassadors and high commissioners gone up under this Government? Wednesday, 26 November 2014. 3pm Baroness Garden of Frognal: My noble friend refers to the 30% Club, which, as she is well aware, aims to Prayers—read by the Lord Bishop of Birmingham. reach private sector firms. None the less, several government departments and agencies, including the DCMS, the Treasury, DECC and the Department for Employment: Gender Equality Transport, are members, so government departments Question are taking part in it, although it is essentially for the private sector. As to the number of women leading 3.06 pm overseas missions, there are now 39, which is 20%. That is an increase from 32 in 2010, and more than Asked by Baroness Hughes of Stretford one-third of these women are in countries affected by To ask Her Majesty’s Government what action conflict, or in missions dealing with international they are taking to address the United Kingdom organisations such as the EU and NATO. gender gap, in the light of the World Economic Forum Global Gender Gap Report 2014. Baroness Thornton (Lab): My Lords, I wish the Government would refrain from claiming that there Baroness Garden of Frognal (LD): My Lords, there are more women in employment than ever before. are more women in employment than ever before, with There are, of course—because, demographically, there 713,000 more women employed than in 2010. The are more women. This is not a credit to the Government, Government continue to bring forward measures further particularly. Since the Government introduced tribunal to improve equality between men and women in the fees, equal pay claims are down by 84%. So why do workplace. A new system of shared parental leave will they not accept that tribunal fees were a mistake, and be implemented from April 2015, and almost 2 million listen to our calls to scrap this unfair system and families could benefit from a new tax-free child care ensure that affordability is not a barrier to justice? scheme from autumn 2015, worth up to £2,000 per child. Baroness Garden of Frognal: My Lords, I hate to take issue with the noble Baroness, but, in fact, the Baroness Hughes of Stretford (Lab): I thank the gender pay gap is at the lowest level since records Minister for her Answer, but it does not seem to relate began. It is now 19.1%, and more women are employed to the reality of the situation. In 2006, after a lot of than ever before: there are now 14.4 million in the progress, the UK was ranked ninth in the world on the workforce. global gender gap rankings. This year we are 26th, and we have fallen out of the top 20 for the first time in Lord Tebbit (Con): My Lords, does my noble friend decades, largely as a result of women’s pay falling not think it strange that, when these gender gap questions dramatically and the decrease in their labour market come up, there is always a call for more women participation. Is the Minister concerned that her policies ambassadors, generals and air marshals or such like; appear to be hitting women differentially, much harder there is never a call for more women to be plumbers, than men? Why are the Government taking us backwards electricians and so on. Can my noble friend also on equal pay? explain why the Government do so much to give incentives and help to women to leave their children at Baroness Garden of Frognal: The Government are home and go out to work rather than to stay at home not taking us backwards on equal pay. The UK has and look after their children? indeed dropped from 15th to 26th in the World Economic Forum global equality ranking, but this is due not so Baroness Garden of Frognal: Well, my Lords, the much to what is going on in the UK as to the fact that Government are giving incentives to women to be other countries are improving their pay differential. plumbers and engineers. Only around 7% of engineers We have the statistics to show that there are more in this country are women, and there is a whole host of women in employment. The gender pay gap has narrowed programmes to try to encourage girls and young women and is now at the lowest level since records began in to go into STEM subjects. We need more women 1997—but the other countries include places such as, plumbers, too. Women who become plumbers find say, Tanzania, where men and women are both on that they can be very successful because quite a lot of subsistence lifestyles and pay, and the gender pay gap customers rather like having a woman coming to help is very small, whereas in our country we have a wider them out. differential. A noble Lord: Plumbing the depths. Baroness Hussein-Ece (LD): My Lords, does my noble friend agree that in closing the gender equality Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab): True. My gap the Government should lead by example? Can she Lords, first, would the Minister care to remind her tell me how many government departments have signed noble friend Lord Tebbit that part of the reason why up to the 30% Club—which, as she will know, is a so many women need to work is that their mortgages group aiming to improve representation in the FTSE