Gender balance among non-executive directors of companies listed on stock exchanges (debate)
John Stuart Agnew (EFD), blue-card answer. – Well President, I am going to accuse you of gender discrimination. Both the people you have chosen to blue card me are male. You should have alternated it: male and female. So you see you have to look to the way you do your job as well.
But the point is that we absolutely have gender balancing in the education system. In fact, if you look at the people who get degrees, more women get them. They are getting the jobs in the workplace, but for various reasons they do not have the ambition to go right to the top because something gets in the way. It is called a baby. I have never had a baby, but I understand that if you do have a baby it can change your life and it changes your ambitions. So the route is there. Those females who really want to get to the top will do so.
(The speaker agreed to take a blue-card question under Rule 149(8))