First Woman (middle aged)
Damn it all with men! I think a woman should do it, 'cause they don't give a chance for women to speak. It's always the men that've go to do the talking. Women never get the chance.
Second Woman (young)
Um, men are easier to talk to, I feel that …I like men generally. Just generally, it's much easier to talk to a man. I feel that a man is more sympathetic, um, a woman …I don't know why, I just like men I think.
First Man (middle aged)
I wouldn't like the to say really.
Third Woman (older)
But a man, uh especially if you're a nice lady, always takes your part.
Second Man (older)
Oh, anyone'll do me, because there is intelligent on both sides.
First Man (middle aged)
I don't know.
Third Man (older)
Well, I think a man better than a woman. I think most people do.
Fourth Man (older)
If they get woman such as …who are like Mrs Thatcher in Parliament, I think they'll do at least as good, if not better, than what we've already had.
Fourth Woman (young)
I think I prefer I woman, because, uh, she might have more insight into my problems.
Fifth Man (young)
With Women's Lib and everything I think women are equally as good as men at the present moment.
Sixth Man (young)
I don't think it makes any difference at all. Men and women are both the same.
Fifth Man (young)
Problem, yeh. Provided they know what they're talking about.
Seventh Man (middle aged)
[laughing]I don't know. I just feel that men are more businesslike, you know?
Eighth Man (middle aged)
No idea.
Third Man (older)
I've seen some of the most intelligent people women.
[Commentary begins. Film of people walking over Westminster Bridge against backdrop of House of Commons.]Interviewer, Tyne Tees TV
Despite the fact that well over half Britain's adult population is female, women have largely failed to grasp the political power that could be theirs. Fifty five years after the first woman MP took her seat at Westminster, there are still only 25 women MPs out of a total of 635, a mere four per cent.
[Film of Transport House and Conservative Central Office in Smith Square.]
The two centres of party political power in Britain stand within a matter of yards of each other in one quiet London Square —Smith Square. From Labour's Transport House and Conservative Central Office approved lists of candidates are sent out to be vetted by selection committees in every constituency in the land. Last October only 160 women were chosen as official candidates for all the political parties, large and small in Britain. Although more than ever before, that was still only a handful, and naturally an even smaller handful was actually elected.
Two of the most politically powerful women in Britain today are Margaret Thatcher, Conservative MP for Finchley, former Minister of Education, now Opposition Treasury Affairs spokesman, and the first woman to be regarded as a serious contender for the leadership of her party, and Barbara Castle, Labour MP for Blackburn, Secretary of State for Health and Social Services, the first ever female Minister of Transport and Minister of Employment during the critical In Place of Strife sixties. They both talked to me about the pitfalls and problems women face in the world of politics. [Barbara Castle interviewed sitting at a desk.]
Barbara Castle MP
It isn't as if one is up against any conscious prejudice. But it is a habit of mind into which men have got, that they automatically feel that if there's some important responsibility …job going, it will be one of their own sex that will fill it.
Interviewer, Tyne Tees TV
In the north east I had it explained to me that local parties are unashamed stick—in—he—muds, and that it is that that is the real barrier to women in politics. Evidently you would agree?
Barbara Castle MP
I would …I think that probably there are certain industry …certain forms of industrial experience that are so strongly male-orientated, that there does become a patriarchal attitude to the whole of the local society in which that industry mixes. I don't think Aneurin Bevan, for instance, was ever a feminist. He would have been furious if you had accused him of not being so, and you know, the wife scrubbed the back of the man who had been sweating underground. And therefore that was a habit of mind which I'm sure stayed with him.
[MT interviewed sitting against a blue screen.]MT
Uh, women, uh, in the Conservative Party of course do exert a tremendous influence upon it. They are probably the majority. The constituency organisations wouldn't keep going without the work done by the women. They are the continuous factor in Conservative organisation.
Interviewer, Tyne Tees TV
Do you think Conservative women at grass root level really realise the power they could exert?
MT
[pauses] Uh, not wholly. I think women are much more modest than men. They're much less self-confident. Uh, I've ever noticed that, uh, the same amount of knowledge on the part of a woman does not lead to nearly the same amount of confidence as a man with the same amount of knowledge. But this is I think almost a characteristic and we have to learn to overcome this.
Interviewer, Tyne Tees TV
Have you ever been able to put your finger on any actual active prejudice against women in politics?
Barbara Castle MP
I think, again, it's not conscious, but I think it is felt most strongly at the starting point. It is getting selected as a candidate in a reasonably good seat for the House of Commons. That's very difficult.
MT
They would say to me sometimes: ‘Yes, we think you've made quite good speeches’—and they were very complimentary— ‘but we don't think it's right that a woman with young children should stand’. And several times I ran the person who got it a close second. Well, in three cases, one in particular—Orpington—which was very close to where I lived, about nineteen fifty …four, it would be. And ironically enough the person who was chosen for the seat resigned about eight years later, and that was when the Conservative Party lost it. I always said: “Look, if you'd had Orpington Woman eight years ago, you'd have never had Orpington Man” , would you?.
Barbara Castle MP
I think once one is over that barrier, and in the House of Commons … [soundtrack fails briefly] …habit of mind changes and one is accepted without, I think, any prejudice at all.
Interviewer, Tyne Tees TV
Now, in making your way to the top of the party, have you found that you needed to be cleverer, more conscientious, work harder, more efficient, than a man would have had to be?
Barbara Castle MP
I think I have had, above all, to be more single-minded. Because there are tougher barrier to be overcome, you've got to have more staying power as a woman.
MT
Can I put it this way? If, when you are going for a seat, there are some of these rare men with great personal magnetism and charm, uh, it will be very difficult for a woman to get it, unless she had, perhaps, even more so. But on the whole, uh, most of us, whether men or women, are pretty organise people who go into politics. We're dedicated to it, we're fascinated by it,but we're not unusual beings.
Barbara Castle MP
To get to the top requires, for a woman, not slacking, not having the frivolous time off, just keeping at, in a single-minded—I don't mean ruthless—just keeping at in a single-minded way. And most women kind of, have too many other distractions in life. Men seem to be able to have the distractions and the power as well. We just haven't learned that art as yet.
Interviewer, Tyne Tees TV
You yourself in the past have talked about women's fear of coming out of the chorus. Is this because of women's fear of rejection?
Barbara Castle MP
You have got to learn how to accept the, um, criticisms and sneers and discouragement that will come bombarding you, and you've got to do that without losing your intrinsic warmth of character, which is very important, and there is a danger that women don't find that as easy as men. Perhaps, they perhaps over toughen up. Certainly I think it is true that we're much more tense about it all, we're more conscientious, we're trying all the time, and we're only just getting to the stage when we can relax and laugh at ourselves and be light-hearted about it.
MT
To put yourself in the forefront of politics, in the frontline of politics, you expect to be shot at. Uh, but I think we have something additional as well. You can get the petty remarks about your hats, or your pearls—which I'm not wearing today—or silly little things about your clothes. Um, I suppose that Harold Macmillan got various comments about his Edwardian waistcoat and grouse-moor trousers, but we get more of them, and they are very irritating, because they are so petty.
Interviewer, Tyne Tees TV
Presumably, though, combining a political life with a home life presents particular problems for a woman?
Barbara Castle MP
Oh yes. There is no doubt at all about that. Women …I've always said—I introduced the Equal Pay Act, of course—I always said it ought to be “the Unequal Pay Act” , because women do two jobs for the price of one. They have to do their job in the factory, or the office and then back they go home and do their job again there. And every woman in public life has always said: “what I need is a good wife” . I've got Ted Castlea good husband, and I'm lucky, but it isn't quite the same.
MT
Understanding, yes? I have had, I still have it, and also from the family, they are never slow in urging me to go as far as I can. But I think there is one other thing we should remember. Men politicians also need a great deal of understanding from their wives. Because the men come for a large part of the week to Westminster. The wives are left at home to cope. And you know it's a characteristic of women's lives that come what may, they're often left to cope. And we often do.
Interviewer, Tyne Tees TV
Have you found your femininity a help or a hindrance in, say, your dealings with the trade unions when you were Minister for Employment?
Barbara Castle MP
I think you, um, your sex is a disadvantage to start, as I explained. Then I think it becomes an advantage. Not in the way that some commentators rather clumsily assume: it doesn't become an advantage because you flirt with the chaps or because you weep in Cabinet. I remember saying once that I wept in Cabinet. I was so cross. I said: “I never wept in Cabinet, except with rage, and that only about a couple of times, and I've seen men do that too” . Women …that's not being feminine. But I think women must certainly remain women, and that has, that has strong points about it. There can be a warmth and sympathy that a woman can bring, which is nothing to do with either being sentimental or flirtatious.
Interviewer, Tyne Tees TV
Do you still find though some times that the people you have to deal with, negotiate with, are suspicious of you simply because you are a woman?
Barbara Castle MP
Well, I have just ceased to be conscious of it, if it ever was there. This is I think a lot to do with it. I don't go into a woman thinking, oh how will these men take me, as a woman. I never talk about it in those terms. I just say, oh now here's some chaps with a grievance or a claim, how does that fit in with what the government is trying to do? And looking at it, at them as human beings, voters, colleagues. And therefore if you … I lose more consciousness, I think they lose theirs.
Interviewer, Tyne Tees TV
Do you think changes are necessary to encourage more women to stand for Parliament and succeed?
MT
I think we've got to encourage more women to stand, because there ought to be more. There aren't more women in Parliament now than there were in the thirties. And yet when you think, we've had generation after generation of women graduates, but not many more have come forward. Of course, it is the thing which we mentioned earlier—having young families—but I think we have to keep them in touch enough, while they've got young families, to enable them to think of coming on immediately their families are getting towards independence, or can take a certain amount of responsibility. Because we just must somehow have more.
Interviewer, Tyne Tees TV
Would you encourage your own daughter to go into politics, if she shows any inclination?
MT
Well, of course, Carol Thatchershe's had a lot of experience of what it's like. Yes, I would enough anyone who really feels that that's what they want to do, to go ahead and do it. It's very much the sort of work which you shouldn't attempt unless you like politics, like the political scene and are prepared to dedicate a large part of your life to it, and to forego quite a bit of your private life. If that's what you want to do, go ahead and do it.
Barbara Castle MP
I think we have got to have a policy of positive discrimination in women's favour, for a time. Just as we have to do that for certain social classes, the poor, the deprived, they need positive help. Equality's a mockery if there isn't a background of traditional …history of equality, and we haven't had the yet. So I'd be quite shameless about it. For instance in the Better Pensions White Paper, outlining our new long-term pensions scheme, which will be legislated on this session, I've not only given equality of treatment to women, I've given preferential treatment to women, and they're going get the same pension rights and get them five years earlier than men. Now, I'm not going to apologise for that. That is something that helps to correct the long years of inequality in pay and promotion and all the other inequalities that women have suffered.
Interviewer, Tyne Tees TV
And do you think all the men at Westminster will tolerate that?
Barbara Castle MP
Oh, they wouldn't dare do anything else.
(2) Evening Standard, 28 November 1974 &(late edition)Mrs Thatcher is right—Tesco chief
‘Hoarders can't go wrong’
Mrs Margaret Thatcher's revelation that she has stocked her larder with enough tinned food to last for years was praised today by a supermarket chief as “a very sensible investment.”
Sir John Cohen, president of the Tesco food stores group, said: “The price of canned food—fruit, salmon and so on, will go up double as soon as present stocks run out. I think Mrs Thatcher is very sensible.
“I would strongly advise anyone with the capital and the storage room to stock up. They can't go wrong. Prices are bound to go up.
The danger
“But I wouldn't say go hoarding,” he said, “We don't want a run on the shops at all. If that happened it would be like the sugar situation all over again. I would say just buy £5 or £10 worth, two or three dozen cans.”
Another Tesco man to praise Mrs Thatcher's prudent purchasing was managing director Mr Ian MacLaurin.
“There is absolutely no doubt that food is rising and will continue to rise rapidly in price and Mrs Thatcher is making a very sensible investment. Food is a better investment than shares these days.”
He admitted that if everyone jumped on the bandwagon and rushed out today for large quantities of tinned food it would cause problems for the retail trade.
Other store chiefs were less willing to get involved in talking about what could turn out to be as controversial a subject as the sugar shortage.
From Sainsbury's came the brief comment: “The danger of hoarding is that it would create shortages.”
Mrs Thatcher told the magazine Pre-Retirement Choice that buying tinned food to keep was “one practical way in which people can offset the consequences of inflation.”
“Whatever happened to inflation a tin of ham is still a tin of ham and can still be eaten as a tin of ham,” she said.
And she admitted to having in her store cupboard a bag of sugar priced at 4½d (old money) dating back therefore to at least 1971.
She had also started to buy sheets and towels her family would need in five to ten years' time.
Mrs Thatcher's announcement—if not her forward buying—was criticised by Labour MP Mrs Joyce Butler.
“If she had done it and not said anything about it it might have been a sensible precaution, but to say it publicly is quite irresponsible,” Mrs Butler said today.
Staggered
From Mrs Regina Dollar, national organiser of the National Consumer Protection Council came an appeal to housewives not to follow Mrs Thatcher's example.
“It is appalling that a respected public figure should take such steps and let the fact be known. It is a very bad example.” Mrs Dollar said.
“Frankly I was amazed, staggered, when I heard of the interview. I have met Mrs Thatcher several times and I admire and respect her, but I must say that I think people who hoard food are greedy.
“ Imagine the number of housewives who will be rushing out to panic buy after this story. We would appeal to them not to—just let this story slide and do not follow Mrs Thatcher's example.”
Atrocious
Local shopkeepers near Mrs Thatcher's Chelsea home were mystified today at her confession that she had been hoarding food.
Grocer Mr John Shean, who runs a shop in Chelsea Manor Street, had never seen her stockpiling.
“She came in here the week before last right in the middle of the sugar shortage, but she only took one 21b bag. She didn't ask for any more than her entitlement,” he said.
Next door, butcher Mr Roy Miller said: “She doesn't put meat in her deep freeze—at least she doesn't get it here if she does do it. She came in here on Saturday and bought about 10 lamb chops.”
Members of the National Housewives Association will call on Mrs Thatcher tomorrow, to demand an explanation for her food stockpile.
Chairman Mrs Sandra Brookes said: “If we can believe what we have read in the papers then I can only describe Mrs Thatcher's behaviour as atrocious and irresponsible.
“Before the election Mrs Thatcher said she was in a party that stood for all the people. But by her action she has proved that she was for just one sort of people—the rich—who could afford to hoard food.”
And the association planned to suggest to Mrs Thatcher she donated her stockpile of food to old age pensioners.
Today the Tory spokesman on the economy was plainly embarrassed to talk about home economics when she took part in a long-standing interview about a woman's role in politics for Tyne Tees Television, given at the Conservative Central Office, in Smith Square.
At the end of the interview, a reporter asked about her tinned food store but Mrs Thatcher said: “I really don't want to discuss it. I have so much to do today. I have one appointment after another. I am too busy.”