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What do women want tomorrow?

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question-markNot laws and processes which are representative of some bygone society.

Over the last few weeks some of us have been digesting our exposure to the realities of female representation in British politics.

The Counting Women In campaign released a damning report not only revealing decreasing or barely moving stats on women in politics but touched upon all industries ranging from the police and the armed forces to the media.

And the results of the Sex and Power 2013: Who runs Britain? report are in – and it doesn’t look good.

Women make up just 5 per cent of daily national newspaper editors and only 10 per cent make up the CEOs of our banks.

Only one in four of the UK’s MPs are women, so in comparison to our European counterparts Britain comes in a tragic third from bottom.

Last week Women’s Views on News reported on these shocking statistics and reminded its readers of David Cameron‘s pledge that 1/3 of his ministers would be women by 2015.

This pledge seems more like a distant promise judging by the Who runs Britain? research, not to mention the latest reshuffle which saw more women axed from positions of power.

There are many things to be done such as  positive discrimination and support for the women of tomorrow.

Yet what has not been asked in any of the media surrounding the report is, are any of these senior posts appealing to the women of tomorrow?

Looking at the working culture of Britain today we witness a strange hypocrisy peppered across the working life of a woman.

As young women we are told to reach for top, and we respond by making up the majority of UCAS applications and we step out into the world of work with better grades than our male colleagues.

However, once the prep work is over here we stand in the promised land of employment and we have to deal with not only the cultural disparities which have followed us throughout our young lives – such as the uncensored sexualisation of women in the media – but laws and processes which are representative of some bygone society.

It feels like women are being set up to fail, as parental leave, childcare and flexible working for both men and women are almost non-starters and make equality harder – and pinning Britain to the bottom of the European league table once again.

It is true we can have it all and no one is actually telling us we can’t.

But who wants it when modern women appear to live in limbo, hovering in a state of dissatisfaction as they are now expected to do it all or drastically sacrifice personal success in order to become, professionally, who they want to be.

This isn’t just a problem women in Britain face.

The American CEO of Facebook, Sheryl Sandberg, continually reels off statistic after statistic demonstrating that modern women face a cultural working hurdle.

Sandberg points out that from being trained in self-depreciation and to attribute success to others rather than ourselves to working the same hours as men do plus completing most of the house work and child care means we are working harder just to achieve equality.

For the women of tomorrow the picture society is painting of women in power actually becomes a deterrent to women, putting them off aspiring to reach the top of the career ladder – and that will leave the situation unchanged.

Our needs are clearly not (re)presented where it matters.

To address the issues raised in many a statistical report we must address cultural attitudes and the laws which do not at present create an appealing picture for future leaders.

Quite simply, if they go on unchanged we will see the numbers of women in power continually decrease.

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