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Labour women surge forward in Scotland
Scottish Labour Conference in Dundee this weekend will mark significant progress in re-establishing a Labour Women’s organisation, writes ANN HENDERSON
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IN 2018, following a well attended Women’s Conference in Glasgow in February, rule changes were brought forward to provide for a policy-making Labour Women’s Conference in Scotland, which would also elect its own women’s committee to take forward the decisions, and directly elect two women onto reserved seats on the Scottish executive committee.
The first Scottish Labour women’s policy making conference for many years took place in Dunfermline in November 2018. It was a representative and enthusiastic meeting, as women came together from across Scotland, from trade unions, CLPs and socialist societies.
Four motions from that Conference will be included in the debates in Dundee this weekend on the following topics selected as priorities: Mental health, equal pay, social care and the state pension age for women, and members of the newly constituted women’s committee will speak to these.
A Labour Women’s reception is planned for Friday night after close of conference, and Monique McAdam and Lorna Robertson have now taken up their seats on the Scottish executive committee. Six reserved seats for women elected at the Scottish Women’s Conference will be added to the Scottish Policy Forum too, once the rule change is agreed in Dundee.
We had good representation from Scotland at the recent UK Labour Women’s Conference in Telford, where over 1,000 women came together to start the process of forming policy-making women’s structures again at every level of the Party.
Party structures matter, and progress on ensuring women’s voices are heard and represented again across the Labour Party is very welcome. Pledges from Jeremy Corbyn and Richard Leonard have been honoured very quickly, on this, and on increasing women’s representation in Parliament and in parliamentary selections.
This weekend gives us all a chance to build that diverse women’s organisation in Scotland, which will speak up for women and girls in our movement and in society. What better way to mark International Women’s Day.
Ann Henderson is chair of the Labour Party’s national executive committee.
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