The island ranks lower than Iran and the Democratic Republic of Congo for female representation in parliament.
That statistic, cited in Lord Lisvane’ report into the functions of Tynwald, is a poor reflection on the world’s long-running continuous parliament – which was the first in the world to give votes to women–- and at a time when the UK has its second female prime minister.
In his report Lord Lisvane says that if reports of a ‘toxic and intimidating’ male-dominated Tynwald are even only partly true, it has a major problem.
He says: ‘Tynwald is almost entirely male; out of 35 members, only two are women.
‘This means the representation of women in Tynwald stands at 5.7 per cent. Putting the Isle of Man into the Inter-Parliamentary Union’s table of female representation by country, this would put Tynwald in 178th place, below, Iran, Bahrain and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.’
He says he asked a number of witnesses why they thought this should be and their answers were not reassuring. It was attributed to a ‘personally intimidating’ atmosphere, one of personality bashing’ with ‘quite a nasty, toxic environment’ and Tynwald seen as a ‘male club’ where ‘the boys gang together’.
Lord Lisvane said there needed to a cultural change in attitudes so that women could be encouraged to come forward to stand for election.
He said the issue was of such importance that it needed to be addressed ‘with energy’ – in the first instance before nominations close on August 24 for the general election.
Lord Lisvane’s reportm to be debated at this month’s Tynwald sitting, outlines 11 recommendations for reform.
He concludes that LegCo should be retained but there should be radical changes to its membership, role and how MLC are elected.
To strengthen scrutiny and address the current blurring of boundaries between parliament and government, he suggests MLCs should not be department members and that there should be no more than one political member in any government department. Currently 87 per cent of Tynwald members are members of government.
Asked if he expected his recommendations to be accepted, Lord Lisvane said: ‘It’s out of my hands, These things take time to implement.
‘All my recommendations are not simple kneejerk reactions. I hope the arguments will find merit with a lot of members of Tynwald. I will watch progress with interest.’
Lord Lisvane has called for a much stronger system of scrutiny with members of the scrutiny committee paid as much as those who are members of government. He said he had carefully not expressed a view on how much members should be paid. Pay needed to externally reviewed, he said.