Emma Watson is calling on Sadiq Khan to put a suffragette outside Parliament - and you can too (original) (raw)
Caroline Criado-Perez, who successfully campaigned to put Jane Austen on the new £10 note, today launches a new campaign with Telegraph Women. Here, she explains all...
On International Women’s Day this year I spoke on a panel about the importance of women’s representation.
After the event, an audience member came up to me to ask what my next campaign would be - following my success in getting Jane Austen on the £10 note in 2014. Regretfully, I explained that I had no time for campaigning right now — earning enough money to live on was taking up all the time I had.
Then, my dog and I went for a run through central London.
We jogged along the Thames until hitting Westminster Bridge, where we turned right. Past Portcullis House. Past Parliament. Into Parliament Square. Past the statues of former Prime Minister's Winston Churchill and David Lloyd George, past military leader Jan Smuts and the 3rd Viscount Palmerston.
After the fourth statue of a man, I stopped to catch my breath and look around. Were there any statues of women at all?
Caroline is calling on Sadiq Khan to put a suffragette statue in Parliament Square
There weren’t. Every single one of the 11 statues in Parliament Square - directly opposite the historical centre of our democracy - is male.
But I didn’t have time to campaign on it. Oh no. A tweet would have to do. I quickly sent one and carried on.
It was only when I reached St James’s Park, that I realised I was already composing the petition text in my head. I accepted a tweet wasn’t going to be enough. I couldn’t let this lie.
In two years time, it will be nearly 100 years since women won the argument that our sex does not render us incapable of participating in the running of our country. Nearly a century has gone by, and yet Parliament Square continues to tell us that democracy is a man’s world.
This needs to change — and now is the time to start working on that. The women who fought for our rights - the suffragettes - deserve to be commemorated in front of the building they were locked out of for centuries.
The suffragettes deserve to be commemorated outside our seat of democracy
So - along with a powerful group of women, I'm asking the new Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, to give them a statue in Parliament Square by 2018.
Dear Sadiq Khan
Congratulations on your new position as London Mayor. In your manifesto you say that you will "be a proud feminist in City Hall”. Thank you for making that pledge. We are delighted that this is what you intend, and are writing today to ask you to take the first step in fulfilling that promise.
In Parliament Square, outside the home of one of the world’s oldest democracies, stand eleven statues. Not a single one of these statues is of a woman.
In your manifesto you promise to “fight to break down the barriers to success for women.” You rightly talk about tackling the underrepresentation of women in leadership positions. But it is not only in leadership roles that women are underrepresented. Women are underrepresented across all areas of our cultural life, from films, to the media, to our built environment.
This underrepresentation of women matters beyond the right of women to be able to participate in public life. It matters because of the message it sends out to the rest of us about a woman’s place in the world. It matters because study after study has shown the hugely positive impact role models have on women. It matters because of a young girl growing up thinking she is lesser than her brothers: less qualified, less competent, less important. Less valued.
In February 2018, it will be 100 years since we won the argument that a woman’s sex does not render her incapable of participating in democracy. It is a travesty that not a single woman is remembered in the square immediately opposite the Houses of Parliament, the building where, in the face of such brutality, suffragists long campaigned and suffragettes fought so hard for such a basic right. It is particularly damaging in a country where women make up only 29% of MPs — we do not need any more reminders of the myth that politics, the running of our country, is not a matter for women.
We know that you do not believe this. We hope you will want to put this right. We would welcome a meeting with you to discuss how we can ensure a statue of a suffragette is erected in Parliament Square by February 2018 and how this can be used to inspire men and women across our country in the fight for equality.
Yours,
Abi Morgan, playwright & Suffragette screenwriter
Alison Moyet, singer and songwriter
Amanda Abbington, actor
Amanda Foreman, historian, author, presenter and writer of The Ascent of Woman
Anita Anand, presenter, journalist and author of Sophia: Princess, Suffragette, Revolutionary
Beeban Tania Kidron, Baroness Kidron, OBE
Bridget Christie, stand-up comedian and writer
Caitlin Moran, columnist, author & broadcaster
Caroline Lucas, MP
Catherine Mayer, author, journalist and co-founder of the Women’s Equality Party
Cathy Newman, journalist and presenter of Channel 4 News
Eleanor Mills, Editorial Director, The Sunday Times and Chair, Women in Journalism
Emma Watson, actor & UN WOMEN Global Goodwill Ambassador
Frances Barber, actor
Frances O’Grady, General Secretary of the British Trade Unions Congress
Jane Goldman, screenwriter, author and producer
Jess Philips, MP
J.K. Rowling, author
Joyce Brenda Gould, Baroness Gould of Potternewton
Julie Bentley, Chief Executive of Girlguiding
Konnie Huq, television presenter and writer
Laura Bates, journalist, writer, and founder of EverydaySexism
Lucy-Anne Holmes, author, actor and founder of No More Page 3
Margaret Theresa Prosser, Baroness Prosser, OBE
Martha Lane Fox, Baroness Lane-Fox of Soho, CBE
Melissa Benn, journalist and broadcaster
Naomi Harris, actor
Natasha Walter, writer and founder of Women for Refugee Women
Nimko Ali, anti-FGM activist and co-founder of Daughters of Eve
Polly Neate, Chief Executive of Women’s Aid
Ruth Kennedy, Founder Director ThePublicOffice
Sal Brinton, Baroness Brinton, President of the Liberal Democrats
Sam Smethers, Chief Executive of Fawcett
Sandi Toksvig, author, comedian, presenter, and co-founder of the Women’s Equality Party
The Honourable Sarah Gavron, director
Sasha Wilkins, Founder of LibertyLondonGirl.com
Scarlet Harris, Women's Equality Officer of the British Trade Unions Congress
Siobhan Benita, Director of Policy and Strategy, Dept of Economics, Warwick University
Stella Creasy, MP
Stella Duffy, writer, theatre-maker, and founder and Co-Director of the Fun Palaces Campaign
Sue Black, OBE, computer scientist, broadcaster and author of Saving Bletchley Park
Vicky Beeching, theologian, writer and broadcaster
Sign the petition and show your support for a suffragette statue in Parliament Square here. Tweet us for more information @TelegraphWomen @clairecohen