Advanced Research and Invention Agency Bill (Third sitting)

Debate between Dawn Butler and Kirsty Blackman

Tuesday 20th April 2021 Public Bill Committees

[Kirsty Blackman]

I thank the hon. Member for his input. I was not trying to criticise the actions of the UK Government in this area—in lots of other areas, but not in this one. Positive steps have been made. In Scotland, we have a duty of gender diversity on boards and it has worked. We have proved that it has worked across public sector boards. It has made a positive difference. People can say that we might not need to legislate for it, but it is a safeguard. It ensures that we have that percentage of women on the board and that we have diversity in all appointments in relation to ARIA.

[Dawn Butler]

I thank the hon. Member for her informative contribution, which I have found fascinating. It is great that UKRI has that diversity on its board without it being mandated—I would suggest that that is another reason why ARIA and UKRI need to have a memorandum of understanding. Is it not important that there is some communication if that diversity is going to be taken into consideration? As the hon. Member says, if it is not mandated, we are just relying on good faith.

[Kirsty Blackman]

I absolutely agree. This measure should be included in the Bill as a safeguard or a fallback—a failsafe. I appreciate the public sector equality duty exists, but that is not strong enough to give me comfort.

When women do engineering degrees, they get better degrees than men. They get a better class of degree—the statistics prove it. If we want the highest possible quality of people, from diverse backgrounds, pushing innovation forward and trying to, for example, make the renewable energy technologies of the future, we need to ensure diversity on the board and more widely in the staff of ARIA.

Finance (No. 2) Bill

Debate between Dawn Butler and Kirsty Blackman

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Wednesday 21st February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Dawn Butler]

I am sorry, but I am just coming to the end of my speech. If the Government fail to support this very reasonable new clause, more and more people will begin to question why this Government are so intent on harming and hindering women and those with protected characteristics, as opposed to helping them.

[Kirsty Blackman (Aberdeen North) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to take part in the final day of debate on this Finance Bill. We have had a lot of debate during the past few weeks. The hon. Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds), the Minister and I have spent quite a lot of time together in the Committee Room, on not only this Bill, but the customs Bill. It is good to be here again to talk about this. It is a great way to start talking about equalities, particularly in respect of this new clause put forward by the Labour Front-Bench team.

The new clause is incredibly important, because the way the Government and previous Governments at Westminster have done Budgets has not been particularly transparent and has not resulted in people knowing what the effects of all the policies will be. I have said before that this is a good new clause and I am delighted to support it on behalf of the Scottish National party. I wish to highlight a number of things in it and to make more general comments about transparency and the processes the Government use to create Budgets and make tax law. The new clause talks about various things, including an analysis of the impact on the different protected characteristics.