This article reviews the record of Scottish women’s representation in the UK Parliament since 1918, and in the Scottish Parliament since 1999. Women candidates have stood for election to Westminster at every General Election since 1918, with the first Scottish woman MP being elected in 1923. Subsequently, there have always been women MPs representing Scottish constituencies, with the number increasing in 1997, as elsewhere in the UK. The Scottish Parliament, created in 1999, has consistently seen a higher level of representation of women than that achieved for Scottish MPs at Westminster. The article examines political parties’ track records in promoting women candidates, and comments on the careers of women politicians. The article argues that the increase in women’s representation in recent decades is attributable to the efforts of women activists, and to the specific strategies adopted by parties to achieve this. It also argues that the Scottish Parliament has significantly extended opportunities for women to participate in political decision-making and in policy-making.
This article gives an account of Scottish women’s representation in the UK parliament since the 1918 Representation of the People Act enfranchised most women over 30, and of women’s representation in the Scottish parliament since its inception in 1999. This late-twentieth-century political devolution can be understood as the outcome of tensions between the Union settlement of 1707 and the growing need for parliamentary time and administrative structures closer to the Scottish people. Such tensions were manifest from the late nineteenth century onwards, resulting in the establishment of the Scottish Office in 1885, and further administrative devolution in the 1930s and 1940s (see, for example,
The same political parties operated in Scotland as elsewhere in Britain, apart from Scottish and Welsh nationalist parties, with the Scottish National Party (SNP) being formed in 1934. The inter-war years witnessed the rise and fall of locally-based parties, such as Protestant Action in Edinburgh and the Scottish Protestant League in Glasgow. The Liberal Party, dominant in the nineteenth century, became increasingly divided over disestablishment and Irish Home Rule. In 1886, the Liberal Unionists split from the Liberal Party, eventually merging with the Conservative Party in 1912. Liberal Unionism proved strong in Scotland, and the Conservatives fought elections in Scotland as the Unionist Party until the 1960s (
All the main parties had Scottish organisations, not necessarily identical to those in England or Wales. Levels of party support differed from England, and varied geographically within Scotland. As Baxter (
As noted, this article focuses on Scottish women’s representation in the UK and Scottish parliaments; they have also been represented in local government and the European Parliament. The wider sphere of women’s political engagement over the twentieth century lies beyond the scope of this article, but it is worth noting that local government has played an important role. Before 1918, women in Scotland, as elsewhere in the UK, exercised their rights to vote and stand for public office. While success in achieving representation varied across Scotland, suffragists made their mark in getting women on to school boards (McDermid, 2010). In Edinburgh, from the 1870s onwards suffragists organised strategically to get women elected to school boards, parochial boards, and the successor parish councils (
This overview of Scottish women’s parliamentary representation is structured around several questions, addressed by both historians and political scientists. It provides a statistical summary of candidates, MPs, MSPs, and party affiliations, complementing previous work, and tracks incremental gains in women’s representation over time. Each section, firstly on the UK Parliament, and, secondly, on the Scottish Parliament, discusses candidates, women voters, parties’ records of getting women elected, political careers, and whether women politicians have acted to further ‘women’s interests’. Defining ‘women’s interests’ is not straightforward (see, for example,
The number of Scottish seats at Westminster reflects the size of its population, although historically this has been overrepresented, given low population densities in some rural constituencies. Over time the number of seats has changed, reflecting Scotland’s changing demography and redrawn boundaries. Most recently, as part of the devolution settlement, the number of Scottish constituencies has shrunk to 59, forming 9.1 percent of the current 650 seats in the UK Parliament (see Table
Proportion of Scottish MPs who are women: General Elections, 1918–2019.
General election | Total no. of seats | Total no. of women MPs | Women as % of Scottish MPs |
---|---|---|---|
1918 | 74 | 0 | 0 |
1922 | 74 | 0 | 0 |
1923 | 74 | 1 | 1.4 |
1924 | 74 | 1 | 1.4 |
1929 | 74 | 2 | 2.7 |
1931 | 74 | 3 | 4.1 |
1935 | 74 | 3 | 4.1 |
1945 | 74 | 3 | 4.1 |
1950 | 71 | 4 | 5.6 |
1951 | 71 | 4 | 5.6 |
1955 | 71 | 4 | 5.6 |
1959 | 71 | 5 | 7.0 |
1964 | 71 | 5 | 7.0 |
1966 | 71 | 4 | 5.6 |
1970 | 71 | 2 | 2.8 |
1974 (F) | 71 | 3 | 4.2 |
1974 (O) | 71 | 4 | 5.6 |
1979 | 71 | 1 | 1.4 |
1983 | 72 | 2 | 2.8 |
1987 | 72 | 3 | 4.2 |
1992 | 72 | 5 | 6.9 |
1997 | 72 | 12 | 16.7 |
2001 | 72 | 11 | 15.3 |
2005 | 59 | 9 | 15.3 |
2010 | 59 | 13 | 22.0 |
2015 | 59 | 20 | 33.9 |
2017 | 59 | 17 | 28.8 |
2019 | 59 | 18 | 30.5 |
Sources: Compiled from Craig (
The first woman to be elected to Westminster was Constance Markiewicz, who, as a Sinn Féin member, famously refused to take her seat. As this special issue of the
From 1923 onwards, Scots MPs always included a woman, generally with several serving at any one time. However, in 1979, Scotswomen’s representation at Westminster dropped to a sole woman MP, Judith Hart, Labour MP for Lanark. Numbers rose slowly thereafter, with 1997 representing a breakthrough, when 12 women MPs were elected. Declining to nine by 2005, the number then increased again. The high point was the 2015 election, when 20 women MPs were elected from Scotland. In 2017, 17 women were elected to Scottish constituencies, and 18 women in the 2019 election. In total, 66 women have been elected as MPs for Scottish constituencies since 1918. Although numbers of Scottish women MPs were low throughout the twentieth century, the longer-term pattern in Scotland has been close to that for the UK. Baxter (
Scottish women MPs elected at by-elections.
Year | Constituency | MP | Party |
---|---|---|---|
1929 | North Lanark | Jennie Lee | Labour |
1937 | Springburn | Agnes Hardie | Labour |
1946 | Aberdeen South | Lady Grant (later Lady Tweedsmuir) | Conservative |
1948 | Gorbals | Alice Cullen | Labour |
1958 | Kelvingrove | Mary McAlister | Labour |
1967 | Hamilton | Winnie Ewing | SNP |
1973 | Govan | Margo Macdonald | SNP |
1982 | Queen’s Park | Helen McElhone | Labour |
1987 | Paisley North | Irene Adams | Labour |
1994 | Monklands East | Helen Liddell | Labour |
1995 | Perth and Kinross | Roseanna Cunningham | SNP |
Sources: Compiled from F. W. S. Craig (
Over time, the proportion of Scottish seats held by women has slowly increased, as Table
Women as proportion of MPs at Westminster, 1997–2019.
Year of general election | Percentage of women elected to Scottish constituencies | Percentage of women elected to all UK constituencies |
---|---|---|
1997 | 16.7 | 18.2 |
2001 | 15.3 | 17.9 |
2005 | 15.3 | 19.8 |
2010 | 22.0 | 22.0 |
2015 | 33.9 | 29.4 |
2017 | 28.8 | 32.0 |
2019 | 30.5 | 34.0 |
Sources: Compiled from Rallings and Thrasher (
Women’s representation in the UK Parliament does not rate highly in international comparisons, and this is true for Scottish representation as well. Following the 2019 general election, the UK was listed in 39th place in global rankings, with 33.9 percent of its parliament as women members (
Following the Parliament (Qualification of Women Act) 1918, which enabled women over twenty-one to stand for election as an MP, there have been women candidates at all elections. In 1918, the sole woman candidate, Eunice Murray, stood as an Independent in Glasgow Bridgeton. Murray had been active in the Women’s Freedom League (
Before World War II the highest number of women candidates at any election was ten, in 1931; only two were elected, both Unionist. In the 1950s and 1960s the number of candidates was usually in the teens, and then began to increase from 1970 onwards. As Table
Women candidates by party: General Elections, 1918–2019.
General Election | Unionist/Conser-vative | Labour | Liberals/Lib Dem | SNP | SDP/Alliance | Scottish Socialist Party | Green | Others | Total |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1918 | 1 | 1 | |||||||
1922 | 3* | 3 | |||||||
1923 | 2 | 1 | 3 | ||||||
1924 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 6 | |||||
1929 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 9 | |||||
1931 | 4 | 4 | 2 | 10 | |||||
1935 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 9 | |||||
1945 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 8 | ||||
1950 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 2 | 15 | ||||
1951 | 3 | 6 | 9 | ||||||
1955 | 4 | 8 | 12 | ||||||
1959 | 3 | 5 | 1 | 9 | |||||
1964 | 2 | 5 | 3 | 10 | |||||
1966 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 4 | 11 | ||||
1970 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 10 | 1 | 19 | |||
1974 (F) | 5 | 5 | 2 | 7 | 1 | 20 | |||
1974 (O) | 5 | 7 | 2 | 8 | 1 | 23 | |||
1979 | 4 | 3 | 7 | 6 | 6 | 26 | |||
1983 | 6 | 3 | 5 | 9 | 6 | 3 | 2 | 34 | |
1987 | 10 | 3 | 8 | 6 | 9 | 3 | 39 | ||
1992 | 11 | 5 | 20 | 15 | 6 | 5 | 62 | ||
1997 | 10 | 16 | 19 | 15 | 1 | 19 | 80 | ||
2001 | 7 | 15 | 16 | 15 | 24 | 1 | 10 | 88 | |
2005 | 5 | 10 | 14 | 13 | 16 | 6 | 13 | 77 | |
2010 | 18 | 14 | 12 | 17 | 2 | 12 | 9 | 84 | |
2015 | 9 | 16 | 16 | 22 | 1 | 14 | 14 | 92 | |
2017 | 18 | 28 | 20 | 20 | 2 | 7 | 95 | ||
2019 | 22 | 33 | 20 | 20 | 11 | 8 | 114 |
Sources: Compiled from table for 1918–1955 by Baxter (
* Two candidates were Liberals, and one a National Liberal.
The dominant parties, or rising parties in the case of the SNP in previous decades, have between them fielded the majority of women candidates. There have also been women candidates standing for small parties on the left and right, or standing on single issue campaigns such as legalising cannabis, or for groups such as the Natural Law Party, or as Independents. Women have been active across the political spectrum, including as candidates for the British National Party and National Front, as well as more recently the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) and the Brexit Party, several small left-wing groups such as the Workers’ Revolutionary Party, Socialist Labour Party, Trade Union and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) and individuals such as Lady Muck Cronin of the Rock ‘n’ Roll Loony Party (who stood in Linlithgow in 2001). The Communist Party also put forward women candidates in several general elections. The growth in fringe party candidates and independents has been noticeable from the 1980s onwards. Most such candidates have little chance of electoral success, although some have enjoyed a rise (and fall) in political fortunes, such as the Scottish Socialist Party (SSP), UKIP and the Brexit Party. The Greens first started fielding candidates in 1983, and have increased their support in both Scottish Parliament and UK general elections, although failing to win any Scottish seats in the latter. The SSP ambitiously fielded candidates for most Scottish constituencies in 2001 and 2005, including a considerable number of women candidates. No doubt this was encouraged by their success in returning several MSPs to the Scottish Parliament, facilitated by the system of proportional representation. However, the subsequent bitter disputes over the conduct of its leading member, Tommy Sheridan, resulting in a ‘spectacular tabloid scandal’ (
Generally speaking, in the earlier decades after enfranchisement it was difficult for women candidates to be selected for safe, or winnable, seats. There is evidence of women experiencing prejudice on the basis of their sex in earlier years, but also of women being encouraged to stand (
As Table
Women’s support for parties has at times differed from men’s. Although the extension of the franchise in 1918 favoured middle-class voters, Dyer has argued that evidence of Unionist bias among women is less than circumstantial (
As elsewhere in Britain, from the 1880s onwards, women began to join political parties, or party-affiliated organisations, where admission to full party membership did not occur until 1918. As Burness (
Neither popularity with women voters nor levels of women’s membership seem to be closely related to a party’s propensity to select women candidates. Indeed, the SNP would provide a contrary example of a party appealing more to male voters, but having a track record of high-profile women politicians. Prior to the 1980s there is little evidence of debates within parties about women standing, at Scottish or local level, or about strategies to support women. However, the Women for Westminster campaign in the 1940s attracted some interest in Scotland (
Since 1918 a total of 66 women have been elected as MPs for Scottish constituencies. Table
Scottish women MPs by party: General elections 1918–2019.
General Election | Labour | Unionist/Conservative | Liberal/Lib Dem | SNP | Total MPs |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1918 | 0 | ||||
1922 | 0 | ||||
1923 | 1 | 1 | |||
1924 | 1 | 1 | |||
1929 | 1 | 1 | 2 | ||
1931 | 2 | 2 | |||
1935 | 3 | 3 | |||
1945 | 3 | 3 | |||
1950 | 3 | 1 | 4 | ||
1951 | 3 | 1 | 4 | ||
1955 | 3 | 1 | 4 | ||
1959 | 4 | 2 | 6 | ||
1964 | 3 | 2 | 5 | ||
1966 | 3 | 1 | 4 | ||
1970 | 1 | 1 | 2 | ||
1974 (F) | 1 | 1 | 2 | 4 | |
1974 (O) | 1 | 1 | 2 | 4 | |
1979 | 1 | 1 | |||
1983 | 1 | 1 | 2 | ||
1987 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | |
1992 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 6 | |
1997 | 9 | 1 | 2 | 12 | |
2001 | 10 | 1 | 11 | ||
2005 | 8 | 1 | 9 | ||
2010 | 11 | 1 | 1 | 13 | |
2015 | 1 | 18 (+2 later Ind) | 21 | ||
2017 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 12 | 17 |
2019 | 2 | 16 | 18 |
Sources: Compiled from Craig (
It is possible to offer here only very limited commentary on the careers of Scottish women MPs at Westminster. Few have written autobiographies or been the subject of biogaphies. Burness (
The Duchess of Atholl had been an anti-suffragist, believing that local government was an appropriate sphere of public life for women, but that they were not sufficiently well-educated politically to vote for the ‘imperial’ Parliament. Her own imperial interests informed the issues that she took up in Parliament, such as the 1929–1931 campaign with Independent MP Eleanor Rathbone for the abolition of ‘female circumcision’ in Kenya (to which she had been alerted by Church of Scotland missionaries) (
Of Labour MPs, Jennie Lee’s perceived support for the provision of contraception contributed to the loss of her seat in 1931, on account of Catholic hostility (
Although some policy interests of earlier women MPs are noted here, there has been no systematic research into the careers of Scottish women MPs which would enable an assessment of their support for legislation and policies particularly affecting women. In general, UK government policies that have underpinned progress towards gender equality – whether explicitly or resulting from broader reforms promoting social equality – have tended to be enacted by the Labour Party. Similarly the Labour Party has the best track record to date in terms of the number of women MPs elected, and was the first to adopt measures to promote women’s representation. Within the Scottish Labour Party, Maria Fyfe took a leading role in promoting better representation of women, while some women Labour MPs elected from the 1990s onwards have been self-identified feminists, such as Sandra Osborne, Margaret Curran and Sheila Gilmore.
The SNP women elected to Westminster in earlier decades – Winnie Ewing, Margo Macdonald, and Margaret Bain (later Ewing) – all had a high public profile. Burness (
Pressure for devolution has been a frequent feature of Scottish politics, from the late nineteenth century demand for ‘Home Rule All Round’, to the demand for an Assembly in the 1970s and the subsequent campaign for a Parliament from the late 1980s onwards. Support for devolution has fluctuated over time. While stimulated in the 1970s within the two dominant parties by anxiety over rising support for independence and the SNP’s electoral success, it was insufficiently strong in the 1979 referendum to deliver a large enough majority in favour. Among the factors subsequently fuelling support for devolution was a growing frustration at the centralisation of power in Westminster, the lack of parliamentary time for Scottish legislation, and a widespread feeling that Scotland failed to be represented adequately by Conservative governments, for whom the majority of Scots had not voted. Labour Party support was for some based on the idea that a strong Scottish Parliament would ‘decaffeinate’ nationalism, or, in the words of George Robertson, kill it ‘stone dead’ (
As noted, much administrative devolution had already taken place. What the Parliament represented was political devolution, conferring the right to legislate in many areas to the new political institution. Key devolved powers include: agriculture, forestry and fishing; education and training; environment; health and social services; housing; law and order; local government; and sports and the arts. Some forms of taxation and aspects of transport were also devolved. There has been further devolution of powers more recently, including other forms of taxation, and some responsibilities relating to welfare benefits. Significant powers remain reserved to Westminster, such as defence and foreign policy, but also powers including a number of areas having important impacts on women’s lives, such as social security, pay and employment rights, equality legislation, and abortion.
The campaign for a Scottish Parliament from 1989 onwards involved demands for greater women’s representation, both in the Scottish Constitutional Convention (SCC) and in the proposed parliament, as well as the promotion of equal opportunities as a key principle for the Parliament, guiding its conduct and style of politics (
As indicated, there had been intense debate over several years about increasing women’s representation, the need for mechanisms to ensure this, and the specific measures that different parties might adopt. Strategies had to be adapted to the system of proportional representation adopted for the Scottish Parliament, the Additional Member System. This combines 73 MSPs elected for constituencies by the first-past-the-post system, and a further 56 additional members with seven MSPs being elected for each of eight Parliamentary Regions. The second vote is for a party, not a candidate, and the parties are allocated additional seats to make the overall result more proportional. The regional lists are compiled by the parties, and where candidates are placed on the list is key to their likelihood of being elected. The distribution of a party’s support also makes decisions about how they allocate candidates between constituencies and lists of crucial importance to the outcome for particular candidates. It is worth noting here that not only is the voting system different from Westminster’s system, but who gets to vote also differs. People can register to vote if they are a British, Irish, Commonwealth or EU citizen resident at an address in Scotland. Since 2015, this applies to anyone 16 years old and over; 16-year olds were empowered to vote in the Independence Referendum of 2014 by a separate Act.
As noted above, gender differences in voting behaviour have declined with regard to Conservatives and Labour in Scotland. Historically there has been a gender gap in voting for the SNP, with men more likely than women to support the party (
Since its inception, the Scottish Parliament has had higher levels of women’s representation than Westminster, and also higher than in local government. Despite the decline in the proportion of women in the Scottish Parliament since the 1999 and 2003 elections, as indicated in Table
Women MSPs in Scottish Parliament elections 1999–2016 (numbers and percentages).
Year of election | 1999 | 2003 | 2007 | 2011 | 2016 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
No. of women MSPs | 48 | 51 | 43 | 45 | 45 |
Proportion of MSPs who are women | 37% | 40% | 33% | 35% | 35% |
Sources: Compiled from
To date, 104 women have been elected as MSPs, which is 104 in 20 years, compared to Westminster’s 66 women MPs in 100 years. These levels have been achieved for the most part through the use of measures by parties to promote women candidates, including the Labour Party’s use of the twinning mechanism to guarantee equal representation in constituency seats in 1999, informal measures by the SNP in earlier elections (
Table
Women MSPs by party: Scottish Parliament elections, 1999–2016.
Party | Scottish Labour | Scottish Conservative and Unionist | Scottish LibDem | SNP | Scottish Green | Scottish Socialist Party | Others |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
28 | 3 | 2 | 15 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
28 | 4 | 2 | 9 | 2 | 4 | 2 | |
23 | 5 | 2 | 12 | 0 | 0 | 1 | |
17 | 6 | 1 | 19 | 1 | 0 | 0 | |
11 | 6 | 0 | 27 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Sources:
It is a feature of Scottish Parliament elections that there have been far higher numbers of candidates than at Westminster elections. At each election there have been more than 800 candidates, and in 2007, this reached a total of 1050. This includes over 300 candidates for constituency seats and over 500 for list seats in each election. There have consistently been high numbers of candidates in the ‘Others’ category; Independents, single issue campaigns, and small groups such as left-wing splinter groups, and so on. Very few such candidates, among whom there appears to be a substantial proportion of women, can hope to be elected. At the least, however, it indicates a commitment to taking the opportunity to have a public platform for whatever cause the candidates espouse. Statistical reports on elections from the Scottish Parliament have not offered a gender breakdown of candidates; however, an analysis for the 2016 Scottish Parliament election was provided in a House of Commons Library Briefing Paper (
As Table
Candidates by gender and party, Scottish Parliament election, 2016.
Party | Constituency ballot | Regional ballot | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
No. of candidates | % women | No. of candidates | % women | |
SNP | 73 | 41.1 | 93 | 45.2 |
Conservative | 73 | 19.2 | 71 | 19.7 |
Labour | 73 | 53.4 | 86 | 48.8 |
Liberal Democrat | 73 | 38.4 | 63 | 42.9 |
Green | 3 | 33.3 | 65 | 49.2 |
UKIP | 0 | – | 26 | 15.4 |
Others | 18 | 5.6 | 115 | 44.3 |
Source: Hawkins (2019).
Reviewing twenty years of devolution, the Institute for Government (
To date, 31 women MSPs have served in ministerial posts, one as acting Minister for a colleague on maternity leave (
Women MSPs who have served in Cabinet positions are as follows:
Wendy Alexander | Labour | (1999–2002) |
Sarah Boyack | Labour | (1999–2001) |
Susan Deacon | Labour | (1999–2001) |
Jackie Baillie | Labour | (2000–2001) |
Patricia Ferguson | Labour | (2001–Oct 2004; June 2005–2007) |
Cathy Jamieson | Labour | (2001–2007) |
Margaret Curran | Labour | (2002–2007) |
Fiona Hyslop | SNP | (2007–) |
Nicola Sturgeon | SNP | (2007–) |
Roseanna Cunningham | SNP | (2014–) |
Shona Robison | SNP | (2014–2018) |
Angela Constance | SNP | (2014–2018) |
Aileen Campbell | SNP | (2016–) |
Jeane Freeman | SNP | (2018–) |
Shirley-Anne Somerville | SNP | (2018–) |
Kate Forbes | SNP | (2020–) |
It has been a feature of the Scottish Executive/Government that there have been frequent changes in Cabinet personnel or in the title and scope of ministerial portfolios. For the most part, even where the title and scope of ministerial positions changed, the postholder continued to hold similar responsibilities, but some women MSPs have held positions covering different areas. Several women MSPs were appointed to Cabinet rank without holding a junior ministerial position: Wendy Alexander (Labour), Sarah Boyack (Labour), who later held a junior post, Susan Deacon (Labour), Patricia Ferguson (Labour), and Cathy Jamieson (Labour), Fiona Hyslop (SNP), and Nicola Sturgeon (SNP). The others achieving Cabinet rank have held junior ministerial posts prior to this. Ministerial portfolios have ranged across areas such as Communities and Social Inclusion, Enterprise, Justice, Transport and the Environment, Culture and Tourism, Higher Education, Health, Employment, and Social Security. Nicola Sturgeon, while Deputy First Minister, was also Cabinet Secretary for Infrastructure, Investment and Cities. Having held the Deputy First Minister post since 2007, she became First Minister in 2014. In February 2020, Kate Forbes became the first woman Cabinet Secretary for Finance. In addition to ministerial roles, several women MSPs have been Presiding and Deputy Presiding Officers (Speaker), and women MSPs have also served as convenors of Parliamentary Committees. In 2001, Elish Angiolini was appointed the first woman Solicitor General for Scotland, and in 2006 she was appointed the first woman Lord Advocate.
Of the women ministers in the first Scottish Executive, no-one had previous experience of elected office, and not only had the challenge of learning how to run government departments, but also encountered difficulties with senior male civil servants, and much sexism from the media (
While the campaigners of the 1990s had expectations of increased women’s representation, they had not necessarily expected women politicians to become so high profile in Scotland, in particular as party leaders. Since 1999 the following have led parties: Wendy Alexander, Johann Lamont, Kezia Dugdale (Labour); Annabel Goldie, Ruth Davidson (Conservative); Nicola Sturgeon (SNP). Kenny and Mackay (
As noted, the Scottish Parliament has equal opportunities as one of its founding principles, has a standing Equal Opportunities Committee, and there is an Equality Unit within the civil service. In the early days of the Scottish Executive’s existence the Equality Unit produced a strategy committed to mainstreaming equality, while at the same time building up links with the various equality constituencies and networks in Scotland. This included setting up a Women in Scotland Consultative Forum in the initial years of the Scottish Parliament, and subsequent support for the autonomous Scottish Women’s Convention.
Policies on domestic abuse provide the clearest policy example where the presence of women MSPs has made a difference, in particular MSPs with a feminist background. Mackay (
Chaney’s (
In general, the Scottish Executive/Government and Scottish Parliament are more accessible to Scottish interest groups and civil society organisations than are Westminster governments. As Keating (
This article has provided an overview of Scottish women’s representation in the UK parliament since 1918 and the Scottish Parliament since 1999, with statistics on candidates and representatives identifying trends over time. Yet this focus should not be taken as in itself a proxy for women’s engagement in politics, nor a measure of their capacity to influence policy making. There remain considerable gaps in the history of Scottish women’s political activity, which must be addressed if a fuller understanding of its impact is to be gained. Although it is beyond the scope of this article to address women’s involvement in local government and the impact of wider women’s movements, as has been argued elsewhere, women’s organisations and activists, inside and outside parties, have effectively collaborated to extend women’s political rights. This was the case for the women’s suffrage movement in Scotland before 1918, and for the movement’s successor organisations and other women’s organisations in the inter-war years. The 1950s remain a relatively unexplored decade of women’s political history in Scotland, but it is likely there are some continuities and connections to be found with the feminism of earlier and later decades. As Sarah Browne has commented in her history of the Women’s Liberation Movement (WLM) in Scotland, demands and ideas from the campaigns of previous generations fed into the developing feminism of the late 1960s, such as equal pay and opportunity and the right to birth control and abortion, even though the new generation of feminists knew little of their precursors (
Since being legally enabled to do so, women have stood as candidates at parliamentary elections in Scotland. The question of candidate selection and the context of the contests which women fought have been the focus of scrutiny by both historians and political scientists. Potential women candidates sometimes encountered direct discrimination, but dominant expectations of gender roles also acted as a barrier. Women candidates often had difficulty in getting selected for safe or winnable seats, a factor underlined by the high number of women MPs who first won seats at by-elections, where the contest between parties for government office was not at issue. The overall pattern of Scottish women’s representation in the UK parliament has been of gradual incremental gains, with 1997, as elsewhere in the UK, representing a ‘breakthrough’ moment. Following hard on the heels of this breakthrough was the creation in 1999 of the Scottish Parliament, which, as a new institution without incumbent representatives, offered the opportunity to push for increased representation of women.
The numbers of women candidates began to increase some time before the numbers of women representatives did, with a considerable increase occurring by the 1980s. More research into candidates’ backgrounds and political track records should prove revealing, particularly given that numbers have now grown substantially. Keating (
Women candidates have come from across the political spectrum, underlining the fact that women are not a homogenous group. They have neither voted as a block nor voted along identical lines to men, although gender gaps in voting behaviour have diminished over time. All the main parties operating in Scotland have stood women candidates for the Westminster parliament, as have some smaller parties. Given its system of proportional representation, the Scottish Parliament has seen women candidates standing for a wider range of parties. The parties achieving the highest numbers of elected women representatives, in Scotland, as in many countries, have been social democratic in character. Formal and informal measures to increase women’s representation were crucial to this process, with Labour initially leading, now followed by the SNP. Over the long term the Liberals/LibDems track record has been poor. The Unionists/Conservatives demonstrated the capacity to support women candidates earlier in the twentieth century, but since the 1980s the general decline of Conservative fortunes in Scotland has resulted in a dearth of Conservative women MPs. Since the inception of the Scottish Parliament, the Scottish Conservative party has had two women leaders, but lags behind Labour and the SNP in the proportion of women representatives they send to either parliament, a consequence of their refusal to adopt any specific mechanisms to promote women candidates. In the Scottish Parliament, smaller parties of the left have had some success in getting women elected through the use of specific strategies for selection, although their levels of representation have been vulnerable when only small numbers have been elected. Commentators on the plateauing of women’s representation in the Scottish Parliament have expressed concern that without stronger positive action measures, further progress may be stalled, and like their counterparts commenting on Westminster have favoured taking it ‘out of the hand of parties’ and legislating for quotas (
As noted, research into the careers of Scottish women politicians remains limited, mainly confined to the earlier women MPs. There is some evidence of the kind of ‘women’s interests’ taken up by early women MPs, and of the impact of feminist ideas on the issues taken up by ‘critical actors’ in Holyrood. Yet we still lack any detailed account of the legislation of the inter-war years, for which women’s organisations lobbied MPs. Nor is there any systematic examination of Scottish women MPs’ voting records or contributions to House of Commons debates, which would make it possible to assess to what extent they may have promoted women’s interests, among their other political interests and responsibilities to constituents. The stances of Scots MPs on key legislation affecting women, such as the Abortion Act 1967, Equal Pay and Sex Discrimination Acts of the 1970s, the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act (2002), and so on, would merit investigation, as would the voting records of male MPs, given how few Scots women there were in the House for some of this legislation. A further question is the role of women in both parliaments in promoting legislation and policy most likely to improve women’s positions, whether or not debated in gendered terms. Also pertinent is the question of alliances, between women and men, and across parties, particularly given the criticism that party loyalties and control have inhibited the capacity of the Scottish Parliament for innovation (
To what extent has Scottish experience been distinctive? The incremental gains made in women’s representation to the UK parliament are in line with trends for the UK as a whole, despite differences in the party political landscape in Scotland, the distribution of support for parties, and the relative autonomy of party organisations in Scotland. Yet, the debates about women’s representation and the adoption of formal and informal mechanisms for increasing it of necessity had to take place at local and Scottish level. This emphasises the importance of women’s collective action in achieving change, particularly borne out in the Scottish Parliament, which represents the most distinctive divergence from the Westminster pattern. This has not only achieved significantly higher levels of representation for women than has the UK parliament, but has provided the opportunity for many more women to take up political careers, to act as legislators and policy makers, to convene Parliamentary Committees, and to serve as Ministers. The number of women who have served as party leaders in Scotland has also been notable. If there remains frustration at the failure to achieve equal representation, this nonetheless represents a major advance for women in their access to political office and parliamentary experience.
From women’s perspective, then, the recent constitutional change in Scotland has enhanced their capacity to participate as actors in electoral politics. Within the hierarchy of political institutions now existing in the UK, the Scottish Parliament has fewer powers than the Westminster Parliament, but considerably more than either the Welsh Parliament (formerly National Assembly of Wales) or Northern Ireland Assembly; of the devolved administrations, the Welsh Parliament has achieved the highest level of women’s representation. This raises the question as to whether gendered expectations of political office are influenced by the status of the institution as such, and whether the level of powers held by any institution is a factor in sharpening competition between men and women candidates. Whether or not such a perception influences political ambitions, it can be argued that the Scottish Parliament may well appear more attractive to women than the UK Parliament. The chances of getting selected and elected may be higher; it is more physically accessible for Scottish residents and therefore likely to make the combination of family and political life more feasible; it may be perceived as being a more welcoming institution for women; and it appears to be perceived as the legislature with Scottish interests most at heart. If, in the current political context, the security of the constitutional settlement of 1999 cannot be guaranteed, it is to be hoped that the greater gender democracy enabled by the creation of the Scottish Parliament will provide a firm grounding for any future arrangements.
Thanks to Catriona Burness, and anonymous reviewers for comments on an earlier version of this article.
The author has no competing interests to declare.