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The new Women’s Equality Party

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Sandi Toksvig, Catherine Mayer, Women's Equaity Party, Pushing an agenda from the outside, pushing the mainstream parties to pay attention.

When comedian and broadcaster Sandi Toksvig announced she was leaving BBC Radio 4’s News Quiz to start a new political party, the Women’s Equality Party, she caused waves in the national media.

The Women’s Equality Party (WE) was co-founded by Toksvig and Catherine Mayer, author and former editor-at-large at Time Magazine – two very high-profile characters well-placed to garner the publicity the party is currently receiving.

Speaking on Women’s Hour, Toksvig said: “Most of the mainstream parties seem to treat women’s issues as if we were a minority group rather than, in fact, what we are, which is the majority of the country.”

Although still in its infancy – at the time of writing it is yet to launch its official website – the party has already accrued a Facebook following of over 29,000, and to date there are 26 branches, with 10 more set to open.

From Brighton to Edinburgh, and plenty of places in between, women and men are pushing for gender equality.

The Women’s Equality Party is hoping to see a number of MPs elected in the 2020 elections, however it is unlikely that we will see Toksvig as Prime Minster.

Nevertheless, as she explained, they are taking a leaf from the book of other ‘single-issue’ parties like UKIP and the Green party in order to push women’s issues to the forefront of the political agenda.

“If UKIP and the Green Party have taught us anything, actually pushing our agenda from the outside and pushing the mainstream parties to pay attention is much more successful,” she said.

According to the party’s mission statement: ‘Equality for women isn’t a women’s issue. When women fulfill their potential everyone benefits.

‘Equality means better politics, a more vibrant economy, a workforce that draws on the talents of the whole population and a society at ease with itself.’

In a shocking indictment of UK politics, over 9 million women did not vote in the 2010 general election. So can the Women’s Equality Party reach out to these women and encourage them to re-engage with the democratic process? Will their message hit a nerve with these non-voters?

Equal representation in business, equal pay, equal parenting rights and an education system that offers equal opportunities for all children are on the agenda. Issues very hard to argue against if you are a reasonable human being. But can this translate to the ballot box?

There have also been words of caution regarding who the Women’s Equality Party will actually represent.

Tilly Grove, blogger for That Pesky Feminist argued in The Huffington Post: “It is difficult to campaign for equal representation for women in business when so many women, especially women of colour and trans-women grapple with unemployment”.

And she added, “[…] It is important when talking about the pay gap to acknowledge that women of colour face a larger pay gap than white women.”

The fact is the Women’s Equality Party could to easily be a narrow-focus party with the spotlight solely on women’s issues.

And as Grove points out, one cannot look at sexism in isolation – sexual discrimination often goes hand-in-hand with racism and homophobia.

The Women’s Equality Party does not claim to have all the answers. But the crucial point is that hopefully enough momentum will be gathered to force the mainstream parties to sit up and pay attention to the issues it raises.

Equality for all women is a political, economic and social issue that deserves so much more than a ‘Calm down, dear‘ or a pink bus. Let’s hope the Women’s Equality Party can deliver.

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