BBC On The Record - Broadcast: 18.06.00

Film: IAIN WATSON Reports on worries that Labour may be losing its appeal to women voters.



IAIN WATSON: Women like to shop around, politically at least. And New Labour is being encouraged to listen closely to their views. The massed ranks of the Women's Institute gave Tony Blair his rudest reception yet and new research suggests that women of all ages are beginning to feel let down by Labour. HARRIET HARMAN: The issue of women's votes which was so critical to our election success in 1997 remains critical and those women who voted for us for the first time were not giving us a blank cheque - they were giving us the benefit of the doubt and we've really got to deliver for them. DEBORAH MATTINSON: Women have a different approach to politics than that of men - they are less tribal and less party loyal - they are more likely to look at politics and say "what's in it for me?" rather than enjoy it for the game and for that reason they are the essence of the floating voter. WATSON: Deborah Mattinson bases her conclusions on focus group research conducted throughout South East England. Her findings are published today in a pamphlet for the Fabian Society - a Labour supporting think tank. Co-authored with the former Cabinet Minister Harriet Harman, it's optimistically entitled 'Winning for Women.' A pessimist would have called it 'Labour Losing Out.' Labour swept to power in 1997- winning marginal seats like Basildon - partly by narrowing an historically large gender gap - the first time women were voting Labour in almost equal numbers to men. But now there are signs that their conversion to the cause could be short lived. At local elections here last month, Labour lost control of the council. And now influential voices in the Party are saying much more needs to be done to retain the confidence of women voters. MATTINSON: One of the achievements of the current Labour government is that it has managed to maintain that reduced gender gap at about 2% - there is as yet no evidence that the gender gap is opening up again. However, what we have been seeing for the last year or so is what I call the dissatisfaction gap; that is to say that women are much less likely to be satisfied with the government's performance than men. Quite significantly so - to the tune of up to about 13% - so I think that's something the Labour Party really has to look out for, because in time that might translate into an electoral gender gap. WATSON: Club Kingswood in Basildon is a plush leisure centre popular with all ages. It's also a place where Labour's leadership could learn a lot more about the attitudes of female floating voters. It could be said support for Labour in '97 was a mile wide but only an inch deep. And now discontent with Tony Blair is surfacing. UNNAMED WOMAN: In '97 I think he was perfect. Perfect family man, absolutely perfect. I stayed up all night, first time I've ever voted Labour and we did all believe, new beginning, and the song that, you know, they were singing that was ringing and ringing in everybody's brain - yet unfortunately I can't think of it now - "Things Can Only Get Better" and unfortunately we all expected too much and they haven't delivered. WATSON: Labour won Basildon in 1997 with a strong showing, the policies they promised seemed to be in line with people's aspirations. But some voters can't quite summon up the same enthusiasm now, they want to see evidence of firm progress on issues like health and education. And women in particular seem willing to believe William Hague's assertion that the Prime Minister is all mouth and no delivery. UNNAMED WOMAN: I don't really see any improvements at all, if not anything, everything getting worse again, they are still, still talking about sort of, what the improvements they were going do with education and health and I just don't see anything. UNNAMED WOMAN: I know I won't be voting Labour in the next election. I did think they were going to produce a lot but unfortunately - we've seen no evidence of that - we just haven't. HARMAN: I think particularly the women who had always voted Tory previously but for the first time voted Labour in 1997 were clear that they were doing it above all because they wanted better schools for their children and because they wanted the hospital waiting lists where their elderly mother was going to have a hip replacement to be shorter, and that's how they are judging us. And therefore they're not so interested or swayed by what politicians are telling them, about what the government's done, they're judging from their own experience and that's why they feel that more needs to be done. They voted for us to sort out the health service and the education system and so far it still feels a bit too much the same. WATSON: Labour strategists are refusing to be blown off course. They say that while the public may be disappointed about a lack of progress on health and education, the next election will be decided on the basis of a glowing economic performance. Unfortunately for Labour, women see only gloom on this front, too. When MORI asked voters if the economy will improve, stay the same or get worse in next twelve months, men were pretty positive, but women were far more pessimistic. UNNAMED WOMAN: I don't think there's any investment in what we need for the future. All you hear is things like the manufacturing industry disappearing. UNNAMED WOMAN: You're getting less value for money, they say your food bill's gone down, but I wouldn't exactly say it has. WATSON: There's a lively cr�che at Club Kingswood in Basildon. But for many women, balancing home and work life remains a challenge. The government has emphasised its commitment to childcare to help encourage women back to work. But a growing number of voters feel the government's approach undervalues those who stay at home. So now there are calls for Labour's policy to catch up with public opinion. HARMAN: There's a new part of the agenda which is helping women to be able to afford and have time with their children, especially in the early months of a baby's life. And that's why there's a new agenda which is a very important, a new radical agenda for extending maternity pay and maternity leave so people can have the time off they want with their babies before they go back to work. WATSON: But some women in marginal seats are surprised that this new agenda hasn't already delivered. The government said new parents can have the right to time off with their kids but some MP's argue they should put their money where their mouth is. DIANA ORGAN: As for the parental leave, yes I believe it should have been paid parental leave; because that means then that parental leave will only be able to be taken by those that are either in well paid jobs, you know, that actually can afford to say, well I can take this leave because it doesn't matter - women that are working in factories in my constituency, they need every cent that they're earning to keep the family going, they won't be able to afford the luxury and neither will the men and I think that we should have extended it to paid parental leave and it should come from the government. WATSON: Women, at 51% of the population, are hardly a homogenous group - an unfortunate fact for Labour strategists. While policies on childcare may appeal to younger women, recent research shows that it's the over 55's who seem to be the most disillusioned with Labour's performance. MATTINSON: The dissatisfaction point actually works across all ages, but the vulnerability for the vote is actually with the older women. Labour's great achievement in fact, in '97 when it almost closed the gender gap was shifting the votes of women over the age of 55, that was where it did incredibly well - those women matter very much, they matter because of their sheer volume, there are many more of them, they are also more likely to vote. UNNAMED WOMAN: Pensioners have been rather badly treated by this government and they felt, the pensioners felt that the 75p on their pensions was an insult. WATSON: The struggle of the suffragettes to win votes for women more than eighty years ago is chronicled here at the museum of London. But there are those who say that even now at the beginning of the 21st century, the political advancement of women at Westminster is still being held back. They're looking to Labour to increase the number of women MPs, but they say it's also vital that competent women are given their fair share of the top jobs in government. MATTINSON: What I think a lot of women have highlighted particularly in the last year is this sense that prominent women have sort of disappeared, where have they gone? And this was mentioned again and again in the focus groups, and I think it's a problem actually. I think the Labour party needs to address this in a number of ways, I think it needs to ensure as many of the new seats that come up as possible go to women; I think that it needs to ensure that there are more prominent women in government and that probably does mean running departments. WATSON: Women used to fight for the vote; now they're fighting for seats. Only one woman has been chosen so far from 13 Labour constituencies where MPs are retiring. The 101 Labour women elected in '97 may find their numbers diminished after the next election, if male colleagues insist on getting in the way of aspiring female MP's. HARMAN: We have to sort this out, we can't let the clock turn back. I think we've got to do two things. Firstly, we've got to change the law to make it possible to have all women shortlists again; so that some seats can be set aside for women, so that that's the only way we can guarantee women getting into the House of Commons. But that would probably, that wouldn't help us for this election, because we are already in the current round of selections; but for the current round of selections there will be some late retirements, and the national executive committee must make sure that they actually use those late selections to actually ensure that we are increasing our numbers of women - it's down to them. WATSON: Harriet Harman also wants the party machine to introduce institutional changes to enshrine women in leading roles. She wants to see a new Labour Party leadership team of three people - one of whom should always be a woman. But some of her colleagues at Westminster don't think proposals like these will help them keep their seats at the next election. ANGELA SMITH: I think that may look a bit tokenistic - what I think and I've picked up from in my constituency, we want to see a woman's perspective on issues at every level of government and every department; ensuring you've got one person in one position doesn't do that. UNNAMED WOMAN: As long as a job gets done, I don't care if it's a man or a women, I think it gets a bit ridiculous. UNNAMED WOMAN: Basically, if a man or woman's good at their job, you vote for them, doesn't matter what sex they are. WATSON: Some say that women MPs did themselves no favours when, six months after Labour's victory, all but ten of them voted for a cut in lone parent benefit. Some of those who defied the protests and stayed loyal to the then social security secretary - one Harriet Harman MP, now feel the issue could have been better handled. SMITH: I think the timing on that was very bad in the sense that the money was made up later through child benefit, but it was taken away earlier. I think by the timing of that, we didn't get that message across in the way we should have done, or acted in a way that gave the best impression to people. ASTON: In retrospect though, we do regret bringing cuts to one-parent benefit. HARMAN: Well, obviously there's lots of things that you know you would have done differently but I think that the course of the government, you're prioritising health and education and bringing more women into parliament and into government is the right one and that's what women voters are looking for. WATSON: The Prime Minister is said to be driven by a desire to prove that Labour can deliver. This meets with the approval of many women MPs in marginal seats. Some of them say that Harriet Harman's proposals on all-women shortlists, and other constitutional changes, won't bring Labour any closer to victory. Women voters find it all a bit of a distraction. ORGAN: What they want to see are the things that affect their lives, which is, better public transport, better terms and conditions at work, better housing, better schools for their kids and better health care for themselves; it's a real Islington chattering class agenda and that's not the agenda, I have to say, of the people in the Forest of Dean, and, I suspect, throughout the country. WATSON: Women have been carefully weighing Labour's promises against delivery. With time running out, Labour must do more to retain the confidence of female floating voters. If women change their minds at the next election, the gender gap could be back.
NB. This transcript was typed from a transcription unit recording and not copied from an original script. Because of the possibility of mis-hearing and the difficulty, in some cases, of identifying individual speakers, the BBC cannot vouch for its accuracy.