Victoria Atkins interview:
In an exclusive interview with The Daily Telegraph’s journalism apprentices, Victoria Atkins, Minister for Women, speaks candidly about her views on inclusivity in the UK.
Diversity, assures Victoria Atkins, the Minister for Women, “is about ensuring that everyone has the same opportunities to fulfil their potential. No matter what your background, what you look like, your gender or religion.”
She was speaking as nine young journalists of varying ages and cultures, sat round her, posing questions on issues as diverse as conversion therapy, the gender pay gap and equal opportunities for ethnic minorities in modern Britain.
The public should embrace diversity, she continued: “We are an open and big-hearted country, we have taken in visitors from overseas for centuries. I absolutely want that to continue in the 21st century.”
Of course, actions speak louder than words. Mrs Atkins understands that for years some marginalised groups in our country have felt neglected, and she talks us through what her Government has done to change that.
Gender pay gap
Questioned on what her Equalities Office was doing to help reduce the pay gap, she says: “Firstly, let’s take victory where it occurs. Of the 10,200 companies we asked for pay-gap figures, 100 per cent reported them. That is an enormous step forward, but there is, rightly, an impatience. Now that we’ve got the figures we want to start improving them.
“And now we want to help [employers] to improve their figures. But I don’t believe we should fall straight into legislating. We don’t just want things to be set in the House of Commons and then expect everyone to follow it.”
The minister was keen to emphasise that the Government wanted to work with employers, rather than
pressuring them. Instead of introducing government legislation, she expressed a desire “to give businesses a chance to do the right thing in the first place”.
Positive discrimination
As part of the guidance, there was a recommendation that businesses should include multiple women on their shortlists when recruiting and promoting employees.
“One of the most shocking statistics that I learnt of recently,” she said, “showed that, when shortlists are used, if three out of the four are female then there’s a 60-odd per cent chance of a woman being recruited. If it’s two women and two men then there is a 50 per cent chance of a woman being recruited, and if it’s three men and only one female candidate then there is a zero per cent chance of that woman being hired.”
She expressed hope that, by requiring companies to publish pay gap figures, it would help give women the confidence “to know their own worth”.
Conversion therapy
Still legal in the UK, conversion therapy is to be ended as soon as possible as a government priority.
Also known as “cure” therapy, the practice seeks to change a person’s sexual orientation through various methods, ranging from phone apps and workshops, to more extreme physical therapy.
“I think it’s terrible that there are people out there that think this is something that needs to be cured,” said Mrs Atkins. “We have been very clear that conversion therapy is something that isn’t welcome in this country.”
Government research this year into the UK’S LGBT community revealed that two per cent of those surveyed had undergone a form of conversion therapy, and that rises as high as four per cent for transgender people.
Mrs Atkins, however, believes that the liberal attitude of British society is pushing the Government in the right direction.
“I know one or two colleagues that voted against gay marriage legislation back in 2013 who have now said: ‘If I could have the debate again I would vote for it’. We are in a much better place than we were. I think it is a sign of society leading the way and the state catching up.”
Transgender
The progress in improving transgender rights was described by Mrs Atkins as “groundbreaking”, but she admitted that “debate has, in some quarters, fallen into extraordinary levels of abuse and aggression”.
Asked whether feminist campaigners were right to disagree with gender reassigned people being given equal access to spaces such as women’s refuge centres, Mrs Atkins said that “tempers have got to cool on the far end of each side of the debate … [as] a proper grown-up conversation about this” still needed to be had.
Aware of the increase in the number of teenagers identifying as transgender, the minister said that young people needed more support in the “difficult journey” through puberty to ensure that they did not rush into decisions. “We need to be particularly alert to this with regard to young people,” she said. “The treatments are so serious and lifechanging, I’m a little cautious of the use of those treatments because of the potential for the rest of their lives.
Relationship education
Many young people resort to the internet to find out about LGBT issues, and 54 per cent of 16 to 17-year-olds say that sexual orientation and gender identity was never discussed by their schools. So is there more that should be done by the education system to increase children’s awareness about these issues?
“We will soon be introducing relationship education, which will be age appropriate, into schools,” Mrs Atkins said. “Not just about LGBT but also for things like domestic abuse, teaching children who perhaps grew up in an abusive household what is appropriate and what is not.”
The Government hopes that this modernised curriculum will be implemented by 2020, but with 84 per cent of trans men saying that they started transitioning by the age of 24, it is perhaps now, more than ever, that support, as well as academic learning, needs to be provided for students.
Mental health services
The NHS has often been criticised for failing to protect the needs of those who suffer from mental health conditions after decades of under-
funding.
Victoria Atkins described it as “the Cinderella service” into which “those responsible for allocating funding tended to not put the resources in that they should”.
She added: “That is why this Prime Minister has put such an emphasis on mental health, ensuring that people are diagnosed and receive treatment.”
Mrs Atkins, who was previously a barrister before entering parliament, said that, even in the court system, more needed to be done to prioritise the diagnosis of suspects with learning disabilities and mental illness to ensure a fair trial.
“Sadly a lot of people who end up in the criminal courts have some sign of those conditions and we need to understand that so that we can make sure that they are there fairly,” she said.
Minorities
The racial disparity audit that was commissioned this year by the Government, admitted Mrs Atkins, made for “shocking reading”.
Perhaps one of the most severe consequences of this situation was witnessed last summer with the tragic fire at Grenfell Tower. There, it was largely the least affluent, and often BAME (black, Asian and minority ethnic), who were most affected by the disaster.
The minister hinted that government strategies to try to counter such inequalities were in motion, though for the moment, she would only say: “There are things very much coming up, which I’m not at liberty to talk about.
“BAME’S department have very much got this on their agenda,” she insisted.
Ethnic pay gap
However, revelations brought to light by the gender pay gap reporting this year have rightly opened up discussions about other forms of discriminatory pay.
The TV news production company ITN and London’s City Hall are among a limited list of bodies that have begun to address the pressing issues surrounding the ethnicity pay gap, after a pioneering pay audit found that the capital’s black and ethnicminority public sector employees face a pay gap of up to 37 per cent in comparison with their white counterparts.
Mrs Atkins describes the issue as “a work in progress and something we’re looking at very carefully.
“We want to lead by example and the Prime Minister is very, very committed to this”.
Despite these assurances, this stark disparity has existed for many years – a problem that the Government has until now failed to address.
Mrs Atkins quickly turned the conversation to the broader question of “how we can improve diversity in our workforce”.
Creating opportunities
Acknowledging that “non-white people are hugely under-represented on board levels”, Mrs Atkins did however touch on one of the causes attributed to the ethnicity pay gap: the lack of ethnic minorities in top jobs and positions within the UK.
“We have to shift perceptions of what candidates for particular roles should look like in the eyes of the recruiter.
“Frankly, I think there’s a bit of work to be done in Whitehall,” Mrs Atkins commented. For the MP, the solution lies in the “education of employers”.
“We can make laws in the House of Commons,” she added, “but we need society to first of all accept what we would like to consider to be social norms.”