Melanie Bayley
Proportional representation. Labour reneged on this. It's the only way to have a vote that counts: it's pointless voting for anyone in a Tory stronghold shire county. It will also allow more women and minority ethnic candidates when everyone opposes positive discrimination on a constituency basis. We need to reach a critical mass of women in the house and far more diversity. We need to move from yah boo politics that turn everybody off and have proper debate not whipped votes.

Margaret Meling
All Parties must take women's views and representation seriously. The manifestation of this is the number of elected and selected women on our public bodies. Just do it.

Denise
My employer, a local authority has agreed for me to wrk term time only following my return to work after maternity leave. I have 2 daughters 11 year old & a 9month old - whilst ideally I would like to not work until my youngest is at school, financially this just isn't feasible. working full time is extremely hard going but Term time only at least has a natural flow to it, and makes me feel I'm staying in touch with my children. Naturally I have taken a cut in salary but Children;s tax credit and reduduced childcare costs have meant we haven't felt the impact in real terms. Ambition - wise I do feel I probably can't progress any further with this type of contract, and I am making a bit of a pact.

marian tylecote
this relates to the issue of the apparent lack of interest in politics by teenage girls and younger woman. Surrounded by this age group at the University of Sheffield, I find that these young women are extremely confident and generally more successful academically than their male counterparts (undergraduates). Their main interests (apart from their studies) appear to be fashion, sociallising and shopping! At their stage of life, everything appears geared towards their success. I would suggest that we now focus our concern on the many failing young men in our society.

Sarah Hudson
What would win my vote? Equal pay and transparency on pay by employers. Education and health (freely and easily available).

Kathryn Moore
As a women manager working in the IT sector, with no children, I believe that equal opportunity for men and women is paramount. However women do need to recognise that maternity leave absences make difficulties for employers in terms of holding open position for a significant period whilst a women decides to return or not - often a last minute decision. In effect there is a period of limbo which in these days of fast delivery timescales can have a significant impact on project success. Similarly where women go on leave, a substitute steps in maybe with a different management style and priorities, later the women returns to take over their position again. This degree of change due to differing management styles in a short period can have a very negative effect on the motivation and successful functioning of teams. Obviously the law needs to protect women and we need to encourage child birth. But women who have children need to understand they can not have their cake and eat it. It's a choice. No children and (potentially) an easier career path. Or children and a (potentially) a tougher ride. Businesses are judged on return on investment not on social wellbeing. It is the current financial environment that needs to change so that company performance is measured on other factors than EBITDA. Change this and (maybe) the impact of absences due to maternity leave (or long term sickness) may be better accommodated.

Anonymous
This is contractually confidential - please do not use my name. My wife was employed by a telecommunications company, in a senior role, earning over £100k p.a. She had an excellent record of performance appraisals, so there were no performance issues. Whilst she waas on maternity leave, the company re-structured and made her position redundant. She was then invited to a "telephone interview" and was expected to conduct this whilst breast feeding our baby, and still on maternity leave. I could not describe the number of maternity leave regulations the company broke, but the upshot was we went to one of the best employment lawyers in the country who offered us the choice of fighting for compensation, or my wife going back to work. The result of all this was that she by now hated the company she had really enjoyed working for and we threatened to take them to tribunal on the grounds of unfair dismissal, wrongful dismissal and sex discrimination. Thanks to our lawyer, the company settled before the case went to tribunal,and gave my wife a year's pay, but she has lost the job she loved and now works for half the rewards in a different industry. The problem with highlighting this disgusting type of treatment is that, whenever a sttlement is made, employees have to sign a confidentiality agreement, so the extent of the problem and the identity of the worst offenders will never be sufficiently widely known. Frustrating, but the reality is that for many women, the decision to have children is still career suicide!

Gavin
Why are we so consumed with the right to work and have kids; rather than the right of kids to have a parent at home for them? Incidentally, I write not as a sexist pig; but as a stay-at-home Dad - who has discovered that trying to do both career and parenting means that you do neither properly. My first child suffered while I pursued a career; I will be there for the next two!