Women’s representation on Council and Council committees (Section 2)

4. We found limited change in Council membership between 2015/16 and 2019/20. Across this period, no party held the majority on Council. Labour remained the largest party with 23 seats. The Conservatives dropped from 22 to 19 seats; and the Liberal Democrats increased their share from 12 to 15 seats.

 

5. Out of 57 councillors, numbers of women fluctuated between 20-21 (35%-37%) over the years.  At this level, there has not been any meaningful change.

 

6.This general pattern, however, masked striking differences between party political groups: an increase in female Labour councillors (from under a third of all Labour councillors in 2015/16 to over half in 2019/20); and a decrease in female Conservative councillors (from just under half of all Conservative councillors in 2015/16 to under a quarter in 2019/20). The Liberal Democrats saw a smaller increase in female councillors, from a quarter of all Liberal Democrat councillors in 2015/16 to a third in 2019/20.

 

7. This was due to complex patterns of gains and losses over the years. The Labour group lost similar numbers, proportionately, of female and male councillors; but they gained many more new female councillors. The Conservatives lost many more female than male councillors; of the new councillors they gained, most were male. The Liberal Democrats lost relatively few councillors, female or male. They gained proportionately more new female councillors, but not enough to correct their original gender imbalance.

 

8. These patterns are related to the election process: the selection and election of candidates. In studying this we took the May 2014 election as our baseline, as at this point ward boundaries were redrawn and there was a full Council election.

 

9. We found no consistent positive relationship between the number of female candidates selected as candidates and the number elected to Council. Sometimes, there was a negative relationship. The key factor in getting more women elected to Council is their allocation to safe, or at least winnable, wards.

 

10. Some changes (the increase in female Labour councillors, the decrease in female Conservative councillors) have been recent and quite rapid: events in just one or two years can have dramatic effects. We consider implications for policy and practice later in the report (Section 4).

 

11. There was limited change with respect to senior positions on Council between 2015/16 and 2019/20. The Labour group retained its female Deputy Leader, and increased the number of female Cabinet members. Further positive changes included a female Deputy Leader in the Conservative group and a female Liberal Democrat Group Chair. However, the Council remained male dominated at the level of Mayor/Deputy Mayor, Leader and political group Leaders, and the Conservative Shadow Cabinet. Council had lost a female Conservative group leader.

 

12. Change was also limited with regard to committee membership between 2015/16 and 2019/20: women remained proportionately represented overall in 2019/20, but were still over-represented in certain types of committee, notably Corporate Parenting, Children and Young People, and Health and Adult Social Care. Conversely, they were under-represented on the Development Control, Audit, and Regeneration Committees.

 

13. Only four of the 16 main committees in 2019/20 were chaired by women, mostly in the broad sphere of community and social care. Each fully constituted committee also offers two vice-chairing roles, normally appointed from other political parties than the chair. Despite the theoretical possibility of allocating these chairing roles proportionately between female and male councillors, the competing principle of appointing chairs from across the political spectrum prevailed and women remained under-represented overall, both as chairs and as vice-chairs. Three committees (Audit, Development Control and Scrutiny Management) had an all-male chairing team.

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Women’s participation in Council meetings (Section 3)

14. In our earlier study in 2015/16 we carried out observations in 15 Council meetings, including three full Council meetings.. The October 2015 full Council meeting is used as an illustration in the 2015/16 report. In our follow-up study in 2019/20 we focused on full Council meetings as important occasions where all councillors potentially have a voice, and which also have high public visibility. We observed meetings in October 2019, November 2019, and January 2020.

 

15. In our first study, it was clear that women were under-represented in discussion and debate in Council meetings: this was evident, for instance, in the October 2015 full Council meeting. We observed greater variability in our second study. Women were slightly under-represented in November 2019 and, to a greater extent, in January 2020; however, they spoke proportionately more than men in October 2019. We relate these differences in part to the seniority of speakers (see points 18 and 19).

 

16. Many individual councillors did not speak at all at meetings: generally, just under or over half made no contributions, though this went up to two thirds of female councillors in November 2019 and January 2020.

 

17. Some individual councillors made a larger number of contributions, often consistently across meetings: these were more often male councillors. The October 2019 meeting was different from other meetings in that proportionately more individual women spoke than men, including making a relatively high number of contributions.

 

18. A range of factors may affect the differences in levels of contribution mentioned above, including the relevance of agenda items to different councillors. We argue, however, that seniority is particularly important: those in senior positions tend to contribute more within each meeting, and across meetings. While there were more women than men in Cabinet, across Council as a whole those in senior positions were usually men (see point 11).

 

19. In October and November 2019 the female Deputy Leader stood in for the Leader, making a large number of individual contributions and increasing the overall percentage of female contributions. Also in October, more female than male Cabinet members were present at the meeting. All of them spoke, further increasing the number/percentage of female contributions during this meeting. This helps to explain differences between meetings referred to above.

 

20. Confrontational behaviour was not common in meetings, but when this occurred it involved men rather than women. We suggest this may be a deterrent to councillors uncomfortable with such behaviour.

 

21. We argue that more councillors should be encouraged to contribute to public debate on Council, so that a wider range of voices and perspectives is heard. As part of this diversity, women should be better represented, and more visible, in debate. To achieve this we need to see, first, more women councillors across the whole of Council, in all parties, followed by a greater number of women in senior positions. This is clearly consistent with the points made in Section 2.