Women give Harriet’s pink Barbie Bus a rough ride...
IT was supposed to be Labour’s vehicle for wooing women’s election votes.
Instead Harriet Harman’s bright pink battle bus hit the skids yesterday as the “patronising” and “sexist” campaign gimmick got off to a laughable start.
The fiasco began when staunch feminist Ms Harman had to admit a man would be among the three drivers taking a turn behind the wheel on its three- month journey around the country.
Further embarrassment came when the 16- seater, dubbed the Barbie Bus, was pictured parked illegally on a zebra crossing.
The 64- year- old MP believes the van will help the party connect with women who did not vote in 2010.
Ms Harman defended the bus’s pink colour scheme, telling ITV’s Good Morning Britain: “It has to be eyecatching. In 2010 at the last general election 9.1 million women didn’t vote.”
But David Cameron took time out in Prime Minister’s Questions to mock the use of the colour pink which he said was “patronising” to women.
And the vehicle, which is part of Labour deputy leader Ms Harman’s “Woman to Woman” election campaign, sparked a storm of ridicule on social media. Twitter users called it “sexist”. Ms Harman said she “signedoff” on the “eye- catching” colour for the minibus, which will tour 70 constituencies in the run- up to May’s general election. The bus made its first campaign stop at an Asda supermarket in Stevenage, Herts. There Ms Harman and shadow minister for women and equalities Gloria De Piero chatted to shoppers and had a cup of tea with some female store workers. Passer- by Nicola Dinnage, from Stevenage, said however: “It’s silly and patronising.”
Her sister Kirsty added: “Them using a pink bus wouldn’t make me vote.”