Suggested motions

The following motions are suggested for submission to Annual Women’s Conference 2023. The closing date for motions and constitutional amendments is 12 Noon on Thursday 14 September 2023. Motions must be 250 words or fewer and on topics relevant to women.

Advice from our Women’s Conference Arrangements Committee CLP reps on keeping motions ‘in order’.

• No more than 250 words. All words are counted, including notes, references etc (but not the motion title).
• Of relevance to women: For the best chance, include wording in the body of the motion, even if brief, to indicate why it’s relevant to women.
• One issue only: Keep the actions that you call for within one policy area, e.g. women’s rights at work, women’s health.
• A policy motion, not an organisational matter: On what the policy of the Labour Party should be, i.e. something that would fit in a Labour manifesto, not on how the Party is internally organised, relations between parts of the Labour Party, etc.

End NHS privatisation

Conference notes:

1. The future of the NHS is crucial for everyone but particularly for women – for example 77% of NHS staff and the majority of outpatient appointments are for women.
2. The future of the NHS in England is under threat from private providers, aided by their representatives in Westminster, who have systematically underfunded and undermined the NHS.
3. That while we celebrate 75 years of Labour’s NHS, the Tory/Coalition governments of the past 13 years have under-funded and fragmented the NHS, based on US market provision.

Conference believes

1. Use of the private sector for health provision is wrong both in principle and in practice – expensive and unnecessary, unable to deliver the claimed benefits and only serving to undermine the NHS.
2. Labour, as NHS founders, should be its primary defender.
3. Labour is not doing enough to bring the severe threat faced by the NHS through under-funding and privatisation, which will particularly impact on women, BAME communities, low income and disabled people, to public attention.

This conference calls on:

1. Labour’s frontbench to unambiguously reject NHS privatisation, refusing funding from private healthcare providers;
2. An incoming Labour government to fully renationalise England’s universal, comprehensive, publicly provided health services with funding levels restored to at least those of 2010 in real terms, and ban political donations from private healthcare corporations and their lobbyists;
3. Labour’s Women’s Committee to work with MPs and trade unions to launch a major campaign to defend the NHS.

243 words

Addressing the childcare crisis

Conference notes:

1. with dismay reports in June 2023 that Labour has ruled out universal free childcare for children over nine months old.
2. that childcare is becoming increasingly unaffordable, impacting the wider economy, and in particular the NHS, education and social care sectors with large numbers of female workers. TUC research shows that nursery costs have grown four times faster than average wages. There are 870,000 stay-at-home mothers who want to go back to work but cannot afford to.
3. that current under-funding of ‘free’ childcare provision has led to a crisis in the childcare sector, particularly in relation to recruitment and retention.
4. low pay for early years professionals means more women struggling to make ends meet.
5. research from the Women’s Budget Group suggests universal free childcare would have an initial investment cost of 0.7% of GDP (£18bn in 2022 levels), but 61% of that would be recouped through positive impacts on the wider economy.

Conference believes:

1. the role of childcare workers in looking after our children is too valuable to be so under-paid.
2. women on middle and low incomes should not be forced to give up work because of the cost of childcare, with potential negative impacts on the individual, the economy and wider society.

Conference calls on an incoming Labour government to introduce properly funded, high-quality childcare, available to all, free at the point of use, starting when paid maternity leave ends.

239 words

Our right to protest

Conference notes:

1. on 6 May 2023, coronation day, under the powers of the 2023 Public Order Act:

• Three City of Westminster women safety volunteers
• Six members of the anti-monarchy campaign group Republic
• 13 Animal Rising activists attending a training course,
• members of Just Stop Oil
• Alice Chambers, a supporter of the monarchy, thought by police to be a protestor

were arrested and held in custody for more than 12 hours, before being released without charge; the Metropolitan Police then apologised for its actions.

2. police violence faced by women protesting violence against women and girls, in particular following Sarah Everard’s murder.

Conference believes:

1. Freedom of peaceful assembly and association are fundamental human rights;
2. the women’s movement has a proud history of protest – from the suffragettes to Greenham, the Match Girls to the Ford Dagenham Machinists – women have made progress when they have been prepared to take action;
3. intersecting forms of discrimination make it more difficult for women to access their rights;
4. the 2023 Public Order Act significantly undermines women’s rights of peaceful assembly and protest;
5. the draconian restrictions of the Act, conflict with a democratic society and will disproportionately affect women’s ability to defend their rights;
6. these new powers will very likely be used against trade unions, women’s campaigning organisations, climate activists and others pursuing progressive change.

Conference calls upon the next Labour government to defend the right to protest and repeal the Act within two years of taking office.

249 words

Women’s representation matters

Conference notes

1. that the 2019 General Election returned the highest number and proportion of female MPs ever recorded: 220 (34%) of 650 MPs are women.
2. this was helped by the high numbers of Labour women MPs elected as a result of all-women shortlists – 77% of new Labour MPs were women and 51% of the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) elected were women.
3. In total 552 women have been elected to the House of Commons since 1918 – fewer than the current total number of MPs.
4. With an interpretation of the wording of the Equality Act 2010, and as women constitute over 50% of the PLP, Labour decided not to use all-women shortlists for Westminster constituencies in advance of the next general election.
5. In current selections, more men have been selected that women, and in early summer FIVE male by-election candidates were selected for five by-elections.

Conference believes:

1. The introduction of all-women shortlists (AWS) has been responsible for the significant increase in women’s representation in parliament.
2. AWS, as one mechanism, should be maintained to ensure women continue to be represented.
3. Having a more representative parliament should mean better policy is made, in the interests of women.

Conference calls on the shadow cabinet to pledge that amendment of equality legislation will be a priority if elected to government to allow wider use of AWS; and calls on the Women’s Committee to prioritise campaigns and activities relating to women’s representation.

243 words

Decriminalise abortion now

Conference deplores the imprisoning of a woman in England in June 2023 for obtaining an abortion illegally, noting that this went against the representations of doctors and other health care professionals.

Conference believes:

1. British abortion law is outdated and dangerous, impacting access and preventing the provision of best care.
2. abortion is an essential part of health care, is highly regulated and should be solely subject to appropriate professional standards in line with other healthcare procedures, not criminal sanctions
3. reproductive choice and access to abortion are fundamental to equality.

Conference resolves to call on the shadow front bench to commit to decriminalisation of abortion across Britain under a Labour government.

Conference calls on the Women’s Committee to work with campaigns such as Abortion Rights, women members in CLPs and trade unions, and women members of the Parliamentary Labour Party, to campaign for the decriminalisation of abortion.

148 words