 The next item of business is a debate on motion 10851 in the name of Angela Constance on international women's day. Can I ask members who wish to speak in the debate to press their request to speak buttons? I call on Angela Constance to speak to and move the motion up to 14 minutes, please, Cabinet Secretary. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. Today is international women's day, a global day to celebrate women's achievements and to call for accelerated action towards gender parity. This year's theme is press for progress. Of course, 2018 is historically significant, too. 100 years ago, some women got the right to vote and the right to stand for election to parliament. It's also Scotland's year of young people, a year when we celebrate young people's achievements and contributions and create new opportunities for them to shine locally, nationally and globally. On international women's day, in this Scotland's year of young people, I want to talk about equality from the perspective of young women and girls. What does it feel like a century since some women got the vote to be a girl growing up in Scotland today? I also want to pay tribute to the young women activists who are taking change into their own hands. They are speaking out against sexual harassment, fighting for equal rights and opportunities, challenging societal norms and saying unequivocally that they want equality for women and girls and that they want it now, not in another 100 years they want it now. On Tuesday, alongside the First Minister and the Minister for childcare in early years and the rest of Cabinet, I was delighted to meet 14 children and young people from the Children's Parliament and the Scottish Youth Parliament, ranging from the age of nine to early twenties. That was the second such Cabinet meeting, an opportunity for our children and young people to raise issues that matter to them, direct to the Scottish Government and a chance for us to really listen, discuss and collectively agree about what we can do about the issues that matter to our children. Equality was right up there as one of the topics that children wanted to raise. We know that some of the particular aspects of women's inequality that we talk about often, the gender pay gap for one example, has their roots in the early years, from the kinds of toys and clothes marketed at girls and boys, where something as simple as a colour becomes identified with a gender, or where the aisles for children's clothes are divided by princesses and heroes, and the character traits that are considered appropriate for each gender can carry through to subject choice at school, and therefore on to career choices. Every year, the charity Girlguiding UK does a girls' attitude survey, a snapshot of what girls and young women think on a wide range of issues and an insight into the pressures that young women and girls face today. The impact of gender stereotypes is clear. 56 per cent of 70-year-old girls surveyed thought that boys were better at understanding difficult things, and 52 per cent thought that girls were better at doing their chores at home. 47 per cent of girls aged between 11 and 21 had seen the stereotypical images of men and women in the media, in the week that the survey was carried out, and that made them feel less confident. 37 per cent of girls see gender stereotypes being used on social media each and every day. 84 per cent of girls aged 11 to 21 also said that they expect equal opportunities with men in the future and think that childcare should be shared equally between parents. There is a strong sense that young women and girls will not accept gender inequality as inevitable. Last year, the Me Too movement erupted in the aftermath of allegations about the Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein. The hashtag has been used literally millions of times on Twitter by women of all ages and men to share their own experiences of sexual harassment. However, the origins of the movement go back further. To 1996, when activist Tarana Burk, now a director of the Brooklyn-based organisation, Girls for Gender Equity, was a youth camp director and a young girl confided in her about the sexual abuse that she was experiencing. At that time, Tarana said that she did not feel equipped to help. That is what Tarana said in describing that experience and her interactions with this young woman. Tarana said that she could not help her to release her shame or impress upon her that nothing had happened to her that was her fault. I could not find the strength to say out loud the words that were ringing in my head over and over again as she tried to tell me what she had endured. I watched her walk away from me as she tried to recapture her secrets, tuck them back into her hide-in-place and I watched her put her mask back on and go back into the world like she was all alone and I could not even bring myself to whisper me too. However, it is as a result of the young woman's story that Tarana went on to start the me too movement and to help young women of colour who had survived sexual abuse, assault and exploitation. It is indeed an emotive and powerful story. However, this is how change is made, and it brings to mind the well-known quote by the American anthropologist Margaret Mead, who said that a small group of thoughtful people could change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. In 2005, seven young friends from Jumpartrum Chapel High School in Glasgow started another movement, a movement that the Deputy Presiding Officer will be well aware of. One of the number of 15-year-old Agnesa Marcelli was dawn-rated and detained with her family by UK immigration authorities. Agnesa and her family had been settled in Scotland for five years already. They were seeking asylum, having fled from Kosovo, where their Roma ethnicity had put their lives in danger. Agnesa's friends, some of whom were also seeking asylum and, concerned by her sudden disappearance, decided to do something and set up the Glasgow girls and started campaigning against Agnesa's deportation and for an end to dawn raids on families with children. They started a petition, held candlelit vigils to prevent other families from being raided and secured cross-party support from this Parliament. With the support of charities and community groups, they kept the issue firmly on the political agenda until ultimately the UK Government announced an end to the detention of children for immigration purposes in 2010. In September 2008, the Marcelli family was granted indefinite leave to remain. The story of the Glasgow girls, Amal Azudin, Rosa Salle, Agnesa, Marcelli, Eulina Seevac, Tony Lee Henderson, Jennifer Macarron and Emma Clifford has inspired TV documentaries, dramas and even a musical. Of course, there are many more stories and testimonies and experiences like these. 2015, Girls Against, was founded by a group of teenage girls in Scotland, just fed up with being sexually harassed and assaulted at gigs and live music venues. Now they have thousands of supporters and they work with bands, festivals and venues at the length and breadth of the country. In Kenya, five teenage girls from Kizumo Girls High School had created an app that connects girls affected by female genital mutilation to legal and medical assistance. It also has a panic button for girls to alert the authorities. Malala Yousafey, who needs no introduction, a young woman from Pakistan who campaigns for a girl's right to an education and, of course, the youngest Nobel Prize laureate. In England, Amika George, an A-level student, has started a free periods campaign for every student receiving free school meals to receive free sanitary products. More than 80,000 people have added their name to Amika's petition. I am pleased that, in Scotland, we have already committed to fight period poverty by providing access to sanitary products for students in schools, colleges and universities. We have recently taken the decision to continue providing sanitary products to over 1,000 women who participated in our Aberdeen pilot project while we evaluate the outcomes of that particular project. Of course, I could go on, Presiding Officer, but the point is that young women and girls in Scotland, across the UK and around the world, are speaking out against social injustice and inequality just like the suffragettes a hundred years before them. Today, another Scottish woman has been honoured, Mary Barber, for among other things her pivotal role in leading the revolt against rent increases in Glasgow during the First World War. In 1915, when men at the front line, an influx of workers to Glasgow's shipyards and munitions factories, resulted in overcrowded tenements, and landlords taking advantage of the situation, hiked rents up by as much as 23 per cent. By November that year, as many as 20,000 tenants were on rent strike, and in his 1936 book Revolt on the Clyde, the socialist leader Willie Gallagher remembers them as Mrs Barber's army, and he wrote, "...in Govan, Mrs Barber, a typical working-class housewife, became the leader of a movement such as had never been seen before, or since for that matter, street meetings, backcourt meetings, drums, bells, trumpets. Every method was used to bring the women out." By then a month, munitions minister Lloyd George changed the law to reduce rents to pre-war levels across the country. Today, a bronze statue of Mary and her army by sculptor Andrew Brown has been unveiled at Govan Cross in Glasgow. The methods may have changed. Social media has replaced backcourt meetings perhaps, but just like Mary, young women are standing up for what they believe is right. We need to support, encourage and above all listen to what they are telling us. One of the findings from the girl guidance survey that I mentioned earlier was that 57 per cent of 11 to 21-year-old girls surveyed do not think that politicians understand the issues that they face today. Quite simply, that is just not good enough, and we should all respond to that loudly and clearly. That is why meetings, among other things, such as the meeting that Cabinet had on Tuesday with the children and young people, are so important. The First Minister's National Advisory Council on Women and Girls deliberately has three young women members—15-year-old Amina Ahmed, 17-year-old Katie Horsbra and 21-year-old Suki Wan. The second meeting of the council also took place on Tuesday and focused on attitudes and culture change. It is in all of our interests to keep pressing for progress towards gender parity, because equality for women and girls is good for all of us, is good for our economy and is good for our society. That does not mean that achieving gender equality is easy—it is not—but every step forward, every step that takes us closer to that goal, is a step worth taking. I am proud of the steps that the Scottish Government has taken. Already this year, we have passed legislation on domestic abuse and on women's representation on public boards. Our STEM strategy is prioritising, challenging gender stereotypes and encouraging girls to get excited about STEM and the rewards of a career in STEM sectors. On Tuesday, Skills Development Scotland organised an event in Glasgow that is targeted at young people from underrepresented groups who are interested in finding out more about modern apprenticeships, including young women, considering STEM careers, as well as care-experienced, BME and disabled young people. Equally safe, our strategy to tackle all forms of violence against women and girls sets out our commitment to piloting a whole-school approach to tackling gender-based violence and partnership with Zero Tolerance, Rape Crisis Scotland and Education Scotland. Those are the formative years for young people and we want to ensure that we are helping them to develop a good understanding of what healthy relationships are and about consent. However, we can and always and must do more. Today, the First Minister announced that she will once again run the First Mentor initiative, offering another young woman the chance to be mentored by her for a year. She has also called another woman to join her by offering a little bit of their time and their experience to another woman or girl to help them to reach their goals and to fulfil their potential. Later this year, in recognition of the centenary of women's suffrage, the Scottish Government will hold an event with young women to talk about what we can do to get more women into political office. So much has changed over the course of a century, much for the better in terms of women's rights and equality, but we need to be absolutely vigilant in terms of the good progress that has been made and we need to keep taking those steps forward. We can and we should all pay tribute and play a part in pressing for progress and never for a minute taking our foot off the pedal. I now call Annie Wells to speak to and move amendment 10851.1, around nine minutes, please, Ms Wells. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I will try and get through this today. I am grateful to Angela Constance for securing this debate today on what is International Women's Day, a worldwide event aimed at celebrating women's achievements and inspiring people across the world to continue to fight for gender equality. The campaign, which began with a women's march in New York in 1909, is an opportunity for Governments and women's organisations to come together to reaffirm our priorities in achieving true gender parity. Following the events of the past year where women's rights dominated the news in the wake of a global reckoning and sexual misconduct, it is more important than ever that we avoid complacency and continue in the spirit of this year's theme to press for progress. That is why I will be supporting the Scottish Government's motion today, as we seek to protect and promote the fight for the rights of women and girls across the world. Tying in with the centenary of women's rights to vote last month, we have much to celebrate in the way of progress. I look at women and girls of today and see that the choices open to them are far greater than the ones that I had. I remember having my careers talk at school and wanting to join the army or the police. Although the reason that I was steered away from this idea was due to my height more than my gender, the alternatives presented to me at the time were either administered of our sectorial roles. I attended a night class for computer programming during my high secondary school, something that was new and exciting for me, but at no point did any of my teachers suggest that this might be a career route. Now, fast forward 20 years, and I am greatly pleased to see the emphasis now being placed on improving female uptake of STEM subjects. In my own region, Glasgow, we are lucky enough to have a number of initiatives seeking to promote gender equality in this area. Glasgow Caledonian University, for example, has worked with SmartStems to host workshops for school pupils, encoding, aviation and digital modelling to name a few. Nationally, we have seen the likes of Pricewaterhouse, Cooperled, Tech She Can, Charter and national commitment by organisations to work together to increase the number of women in tech roles in the UK and to share best practices. At the moment, just 5 per cent of STEM apprenticeships starts in Scotland under women, and in the UK as a whole, the percentage of women studying STEM degrees make up to just 25 per cent of the total, a figure that has been stagnant for the past two years. What is required, if we are, to have a serious impact on these figures, and I welcome the efforts by the Scottish Government to improve girls' uptake of STEM subjects, but we also have to ask ourselves as individuals how we are encouraging young women and girls in our own lives to consider a career in STEM. In Scotland's year of the young people, it is more important than ever that we look at how education and decisions made early in life impact young women for the rest of their lives. When it comes to women in the workplace more generally, figures relating to the gender pay gap make for truly uncomfortable reading. Four decades on since the gender pay gap was passed, the UK gender pay gap remains remarkably high. According to the ONS, when all workers are included, the pay gap is 18.4 per cent, meaning that women effectively work for free for six to seven days of the year. In recent months, I am pleased to say that this has been spoken about more and more in the media and that women are becoming increasingly aware and confident challenging the gilf that exists between male and female pay. As we recently saw with presenters at the BBC, it is absolutely right to challenge the status quo. After figures came to light showing that most of the top earners were men, the gender pay gap became an embarrassing shadow that it could no longer ignore. Transparency, this is key. By just a few figures being made public, there has been a snowball effect with pressure now being laid upon the BBC to publish data on the individual salaries of all of its staff. I sincerely hope that the UK Government's wider policy on mandatory gender pay gap reporting will have a similar effect, creating a culture whereby companies simply cannot afford to tarnish their image in this way. Addressing why the gender pay gap exists, we must also look at why women are not better represented in the high-level executive jobs that we associate with high pay and big bonuses. Although we have made different times and solutions, I am sure that we can all agree that there are clearly deep-rooted cultural and societal barriers holding women taking top jobs. Culturally, I strongly believe that we are still peddling the same gender stereotypes of what we expect from girls and boys as they grow up. Women are still also faced with the overwhelming societal expectation that they should lead in childcare. Companies desperately need to incorporate organisational designs that recognise these pressures and bring talented women up through the pipeline. These companies do exist, as I have said many times with the example of FDM based in Glasgow. We must, as politicians, seek out exemplary businesses and champion them in the way that encourages others. International Women's Day is not just about the UK. With the World Economic Forum's 2017 global gender gap report telling us that gender parity is over 200 years away, the wellbeing and status of women across the world is central to our fight. To put into context, one in three women globally have experienced some physical or sexual abuse. One in five girls are believed to be married before the age of 18. Under the two thirds of the world's illiterate adults are women and in developing countries and rural areas, agriculture remains the most important employment sector for women, a sector that largely falls within the informal economy with little or no social protection and labour rights. I am pleased that the UK Aid funded programmes are working with organisations across the world to end violence against women and girls and challenge the discriminatory practices that hold women back in family life, education and their working lives. We must also strive to do more. Creating a life for millions of women where they don't feel discriminated against or in danger are still missing out on their desired opportunities. It should be a name that transcends this chamber and beyond. To finish today, Presiding Officer, it wouldn't be right of me to not wish everyone a happy International Women's Day but also to wish the same to my mum, who is an inspiration to me. I would have got it in the neck if I had mentioned her. As elected representatives, I believe that we all have a duty to work together as a Parliament and, indeed, in countries across the world to do more to achieve full equality for women. We sense the tide is turning but we should never be complacent. We are 200 years away from achieving gender equality, and that is 200 years too long. I move the amendment in my name. I call Rhoda Grant to speak to and move amendment 10851.2 for around seven minutes. I move amendment 10851 in my name. I wish that my role as woman and equality spokesperson didn't need to exist, and I also wish that international women's day didn't need to exist. However, after 100 years since the first woman in this country was allowed to vote and 109 years since the first international women's day, there are still many battles that we need to be won. The theme of this year's international women's day is press for progress, and that is the reasoning behind our amendment. While the Government's motion talks about progress made, our amendment keeps pressing for progress, and I think that that creates the right balance. My colleague Monica Lennon will take the opportunity to speak about her campaign to stop period poverty when she winds up the debate. Again, it is an issue that has been long overlooked, but it has become a real difficulty in those times of austerity. Low pay and access to benefits make sanitary products unaffordable and therefore keeps women and girls out of education and out of the workplace. This is an issue that has gained support throughout the chamber, so we need to continue to press for progress. The support is there, we need to make the progress. Every year, on international women's day, there are celebrations and events all over the country and all over the world. While it is great to see many male feminists acknowledging and thanking women for their contribution to society, it still remains that the best way to really thank women is to treat them with respect and treat them as fellow human beings deserving equality. There are many inherent issues that are holding women back from fulfilling their potential. Violence, abuse and sexual harassment are seen as women's issues, even though the perpetrators are usually men. Therefore, it is a man's problem. Inequality in terms of pay and representation prevents women from reaching their economic possibilities as well as having the political power to change the system, which has already started against them. When you add to all of that any of the protected characteristics, then women fear even worse. Women with disabilities, black and ethnic minority women and lesbians all face greater challenges and greater inequalities. We need to press for progress against violence against women. This Parliament has passed legislation criminalising psychological gender-based violence. I believe that many of our early members could only dream off, but now we have achieved that. It will be difficult to prosecute, but we must keep evaluating the impact and making sure that the police and the prosecution services have the knowledge and training to do that. Without adequate training, perpetrators will get away, victims will not get justice. As we have all seen with regard to revenge porn, just this week it was revealed that more than 60 per cent of cases under the new revenge porn legislation reported to the police of not being passed to prosecutors. We need better justice for victims. Therefore, even with some successes that we all celebrate, there is still much more to do. We have women suffering violence and we need to strengthen the support services that help them to rebuild their lives. We have a huge gap between the criminal law and family law. A criminal court convicts someone of domestic abuse, yet the civil court often grants that same person access to their children and thereby to their abused partner. The abuser has access to all his victims to continue that abuse. How can the courts be so ignorant of the damage that this does to a child and the abused partner? The child is damaged by the abuse. Their self-esteem is affected, their sense of safety and resilience is undermined and this damage can last a lifetime and have a serious impact on their future, yet we have courts that facilitate that abuse on behalf of the state. How wrong is that? We really need to introduce as a matter of urgency legislation that protects children. We need domestic abuse courts throughout the country, staffed by suitably trained staff. The fiscal and sheriffs need to know what they are dealing with and have a true understanding of the crime. Those same courts need to deal with family law issues arising out of cases such as custody and access and divorce. That also highlights the need for split payments. Richard Leonard at First Minister's Questions raised the issue. Domestic abuse starts with financial abuse. Women need to be able to have financial independence and the Government must look at its stance on this and change it at stage 3 to give women the protection that they need. We need to press for progress on sexual exploitation to free women from the damaging practice that is increasing in our society rather than decreasing. If we want to see true equality, women cannot and should not be commodities to be bought and sold in Scotland because that demeans all women. Sexual exploitation creates an atmosphere of entitlement in men and therefore encourages sexual violence. Respect within relationship is not taught to young people at home or in school. They learn much of their sex education from extreme pornography, which also leads to an increase in sexual violence. How can you be equal if you do not command the same respect as someone of the opposite sex? Recently, the High Court ruled that women who had been forced into prostitution and criminalised as a result should not have to reveal those convictions. Although the ruling is a step in the right direction, it seems very odd to me that it can still be convicted but that it is against its human rights to be forced to reveal those convictions. Can I ask the Scottish Government what steps it is taking with regard to the ruling and whether it will lead to changes in our legislation here in Scotland? It is simply wrong that women are criminalised and the men who have abused them get off scot-free. Fiona Broadfoot, one of the women who took the case, said, not one of those men who bought, unused and abused me. Even the ones who knew fine well that I was a child when I was first put on the streets has ever had to face the consequences of his actions. It is time for change and we need to press for progress. While we take pride of all the advances that are made, we recognise that we are still a long way off from true equality. On International Women's Day, we need to redouble our efforts, we need to press for progress and we need to make progress. I hope that in my lifetime those debates will no longer exist and I hope in my lifetime that women will be truly equal. Now move to the open debate. It is speeches of six minutes. However, I do have quite a bit of time in hand, so there is room to be flexible in terms of interventions and giving time back. I call Gail Ross to be followed by Margaret Mitchell. Today is International Women's Day and someone who shall remain nameless said to me earlier on when is international men's day. That reminded me of when I was younger on Mother's Day, when I rather petulantly asked my mum when is daughter's day and her response every day is daughter's day. International Women's Day is a celebration held across the world to mark the economic, political and social achievements of women past, present and future. In 1908, 15,000 women marched through the streets of New York, demanding better pay, working hours and the right to vote. In 1910, at the international conference of working women in Copenhagen, a vote was passed that proposed in every country on the same day a national day of women would be held to highlight inequality wherever it was found, whether in the home or at work, and to press the need for change. In 1911, the day was held in a number of European countries on March 19, and it wasn't until 1913 that an internationally agreed date of March 8 was agreed. By that time, millions of women across the globe had become aware of the need to highlight terrible working conditions, the complete absence of any legislative employment protections and provided a platform for social justice. In 1975, the United Nations announced the international women's year. Before 1975, most married women could only get credit if a man guaranteed their loan. Girls were not allowed to play rugby and football at school, and many schools taught different subjects to boys and girls. That was only two years before I was born. In 1999, the STUC put forward a women's agenda for the Scottish Parliament, including championing family-friendly policies, equal pay and tackling bullying and harassment, extending the provision of flexible, accessible and affordable childcare, embracing the principles of lifelong learning and ensuring that women are properly represented within the Parliament at all levels of policy and decision making. How far have we come? We have already passed some ground-breaking legislation in this parliamentary term that will undoubtedly help women, but it is not just legislation that we pass in this chamber that has an effect on how we see and treat women, because as far as we have come, we still have much to do. Some of the attitudes that still exist in society today find an outlet in the remarks, insults and sometimes even threats aimed at female politicians. Every day, correspondence to my office can and does include language and comments that would never be included in correspondence to a man, and I know that because I used to work for a male MSP. We see much worse online—comments on everything from appearance to sexuality, people typing whatever comes into their head without consideration of the consequences. It is not true that, once you become elected, you become some political robot. We are still human beings with feelings and families. We cannot pretend that the results from the recent sexual harassment survey conducted here in this very building are anything but highly alarming, but it is international women's day, so I want to take a minute to talk about one inspirational woman from international politics. Any female politician, or to be honest, any female that has not read Hilary Clinton's book What Happened Should Do So Immediately? Whether you agree with her politics or not, she gives a great insight into the way she was treated during the presidential election campaign, and I was struck by a paragraph where she talks about some advice that she received about being a female politician. Women are seen favourably when they advocate for others, but unfavourably when they advocate for themselves. For example, there is virtually no downside to asking for a raise if you are a man. You will either get it or you will not, but you will not be penalised for trying. A woman who does the same is much more likely to pay a price. Even if she gets a salary bump, she will lose a measure of goodwill. The exception is when a woman asks for a raise on someone else's behalf, then she is seen as generous and a team player. You have a steep mountain to climb. They will have no empathy for you. To move on to science, we all know the name of Marie Curie, the first person to win two Nobel prizes, but how many people know that she was actually prevented from joining France's Academy of Science because she was a woman? Rosalyn Franklin played a huge part in decoding the structure of DNA, but three men claimed the Nobel Prize for her discovery. Astrophysicist Jocelyn Bell-Bernel discovered pulsars. Her male supervisor claimed the Nobel Prize. Lee's meetner was pivotal in the discovery of nuclear fission, but not only did she fail to get the Nobel Prize, she wasn't even allowed on the floor where the male scientists worked. Again, we've come so far, but we still have more to do. We see so much lip service paid to women's rights, warm words on social media, good intentions, outlined in press releases, but words are no substitute for deeds. Action is required and not just a crowd-pleasing box-ticking exercise. We need to adopt a zero-tolerance approach to sexual harassment and abuse, a zero-tolerance approach to gender-based violence, to female genital mutilation, to the belittling sexist, misogynist language, judging women on their appearance, saying that 50-50 quotas prevent women taking positions on merit, women have the merit, quotas merely give them the opportunities. A zero-tolerance approach to being treated like second-class citizens, like we should still be chained to the sink, barefoot and pregnant, this year will prove to be pivotal in the fight for women's rights, equality and respect. We won't settle for being paid less than men. We won't settle for being asked in an interview if we are planning to start a family. We are here to contribute to challenge and to compete. Let's celebrate all the women. I will celebrate my mum, my sisters, my aunties, my nieces, my cousins, my friends, my sisters in this chamber and my sisters around the world. I will bring up my own son to celebrate and respect women. Women are looking for us here to set not just laws but an example. Let's make sure, first and foremost, that this Parliament can be held up as a place where women feel safe, valued and appreciated. Let's make sure that every day is women's day. I welcome the opportunity to speak in this international women's day debate. There are many topics that could be covered today. The gender pay gap, childcare provision, sexual harassment, violence and abuse against women domestically and in war zones, an equal representation to name a few. However, I would like to focus on the legal profession and to look at the number of young girls choosing to study law, the opportunities that they and women have within the profession and, in particular, to assess the progress that has been made in this currently male-dominated profession. Here, interestingly, according to the latest statistics available from SPICE, in 2015-16, of the students graduating with a law degree in Scotland, 63.5 per cent were female and 36.5 per cent were male. In the same year, of those completing the diploma in professional legal practice required after the LLB degree to become a slister, 66.1 per cent were female compared to 33.9 per cent male. Since 2012, according to the Law Society, more women have completed legal traineeships than men. In 2016-17, that equates to 322 women to 173 men. Thereafter, as the next career stages progress, it becomes evident that the higher percentages of women to men starts to decline. In 2015, there were marginally more fully qualified female lawyers who were holding practising certificates than male lawyers. However, in terms of women reaching the top of the legal profession, during the last decade, Scotland can be proud of some exceptional women who have provided hugely encouraging examples of how women can lead the way for the younger intake of female lawyers. Scotland's first female Lord Advocate, the head of the criminal prosecution service in Scotland, Dame Eilish Angelini, was appointed in 2006 and held the post until 2011. The head of the judiciary in Scotland, the Lord President of the Court of Session and Lord Justice General, has never been a woman. The Lord Justice Clerk, Scotland's second most senior judge, is, for the very first time, a woman, Lady Dorian. John Mason, I thank the member for giving way. I am fascinated by her progression of this. I am not sure where she is going, but we looked at the gender pay gap on the economy committee. Does she think that it is just a matter of time till women take up more senior positions, or do we need to do something positive to move that forward? I have to develop that thing, but my point is that just now there are many more young girls qualifying in law, so I would expect to see a corresponding increase in them fulfilling those places. As we go on, I hope to tell you what needs to happen to try to encourage that. Furthermore, of the current 35 senators of the College of Justice in Scotland, who sit in the Court of Session on the High Court, 10 are women. At sheriff court level, however, the number is less encouraging. Of the 142 permanent or resident sheriffs sitting in our 39 sheriff courts, only 27 are women. At a UK level, the Supreme Court is led by the Barness Hale of Richmond, the first ever female head of the judiciary in the United Kingdom. She was also the first woman lawlord in 2004, and then the first woman justice of the Supreme Court in 2009. However, of the 11 other members of the Supreme Court, only one other justice, Lady Black of Derwent, is a woman. At a European level, the European Parliament conducted a study of the legal profession across EU countries in August 2017. That revealed that women predominate in practice areas such as family and child law, and that their presence in commercial law practice areas is increasing. That trend has been reflected in an increase in the number of female partners in large pan-European law firms. Significantly, the reason for that change is that commercial practice is becoming more about negotiation and client care than about contentious litigation, and that that in turn has seen an increased requirement for skills that are, and I quote, seen as those stereotypically possessed by women. This European study was also found that although there is an increase in females entering the legal profession and becoming partners, the numbers of women progressing to partnership or to elite levels in the advocacy profession is still very small. Scotland has much to be proud of, and there has undoubtedly been a significant increase in the number of women entering the legal profession. Equally, with some notable exceptions, there is still a steep hill to climb before that trend is reflected at the top of the law profession in years to come. I hope that by raising awareness about stereotypes and by addressing the wider societal issues such as adequate childcare provision and the presumption as to who bears the burden of caring for children or other dependence that a level playing field can be achieved in providing all women with the opportunities to reach the top of the legal profession. In the meantime, we recognise and pay tribute to trailblazers such as Lady Hill and Dame Angelini for the breakthroughs that they made that will pave the way for future generations of women. I call Christina McKelvie to be followed by Claudia Beamish. Presiding Officer, it is a good place to start where Margaret Mitchell has just finished off, because gender parity is at least 200 years away, says the World Economic Forum's global gender gap report. Even slaves did not wait that long to have their freedom respected. While we know that gender parity will not happen overnight or even maybe in three centuries, the good news is that across the world, women are making positive gains day by day. Plus, there is indeed a very strong and growing global movement of advocacy, activism and support. We in Scotland will not let up. Now more than ever, there is a strong call to action to push forward and progress gender parity, a strong call to progress to press for progress, a strong call to motivate and unite friends, colleagues and whole communities to think, act and be gender inclusive. The press for progress campaign has five asks, and they are to maintain a gender parity mindset, challenge stereotypes and bias, forge positive visibility of women—we are doing very well today, girls—and influence others' beliefs and actions and celebrate women's achievements. In my, we have got a lot to celebrate. Every one of us in this chamber has a responsibility, regardless of your gender, to actively support equality and fairness in all of its facets. I have said in this chamber before that men of quality should never fear equality, and that is a good statement for today. We have legislation, commissions, equal rights and legal protection, provided by ECHR and European law, reinforced by our own laws around fairness and equality for all people. We have had some major victories, hard and well-won against employers who have underpaid female staff for decades, which is why today is a great day for saying, no, we won't sit quietly and accept the status quo. We will fight it all the time and we will fight it hard until the need for fighting has gone because inequality will have then have gone. We need to press still harder for progress, to risk irritating some angry men, and perhaps most important of all, stop seeing ourselves as the second-rate humans some members of society seem to feel is appropriate to call us. Women of every age, background, ethnicity, religion, prosperous or not, are already engaged in this process. What we all want and what Scotland is determined to win is quite simple to be treated equally. It's not that difficult. If we look at some of the international examples of that, take the Mizzouzou coffee planters co-operative union, for instance. They grow and trade in coffee beans in Malawi. Those coffee beans were originally transported via Zanzibar from the Edinburgh Botanic gardens, so we have a link to that coffee that has grown in Malawi. The other night, I met Bernard Cownda, who is the general manager of the Mizzouzou coffee planter co-operative union at the Hamilton Fair Trade Group meeting. He informed me of a great success of a gendered aspect of the work that they do with women. It includes coffee being produced by women being sold with a £0.20 premium added. That £0.20 is saved and distributed to women in a microfinancing model to build business and grow local economies. It has been incredibly successful and has resulted in many new women entrepreneurs and businesses developing in Malawi, all from a coffee bean from Edinburgh. Let's take that a bit more locally, too. Jigsaw travel in Wellhall Road in Hamilton was founded in 1998 by Leslie Miller. The business is a corporate bespoke travel company specialising in complex personalised travel bookings. That company is the winner of the Scottish Passenger Agents Association's Best Small Business travel agent award in 2017-16. It has been nominated for several Glasgow business awards and Lanarkshire business awards. It has clients from all over the UK, so what was a local business, like that coffee bean, has now grown to have a very strong national base. The Federation of Small Business has nominated Leslie as one of the top 100 businesswomen in the UK, a super accolade for Leslie and her team. The business has now grown to employ seven members of staff, all of them women. I am sure that you will agree with me, Presiding Officer, that to have such a thriving business within my constituency highlighted today of all days is incredibly appropriate. Those are all great successes, but we have so much more to do, and even in our Government structures we have work to do. In Yal'swood detention centre today, Presiding Officer, 120 women are on hunger strike, a centre that is described by the Inspector of Prisons as a place of national concern. The organisers of the protests that they are holding today outside Yal'swood tell us that the strike is a refusal to submit to institutionally racist detention conditions, which is an integral part of the hostile environment policy that is currently enforced by the UK Government, a sad indictment. The Home Office wrote to those women on Saturday that the hunger strikers threatened to expedite their extradition and refused to listen to their demands. Some of those women are experiencing horrific conditions within Yal'swood, including sexual assault. I stand with those women today and I ask my colleagues in this chamber to do the same and send that message of solidarity. Last year, Presiding Officer, the Pussyhat revolution resulted in me getting around from the Presiding Officer for donning my fetching pink hat. I will not be doing that this year, Presiding Officer, but the message is still absolutely clear—she has got her evil eye on it. A small push might be against the establishment, but every act of pressing for progress takes us closer to that more equal world that we all wish to live in. Just like those suffragists 100 years ago with her good cause, we have many good causes and we have heard of them today. One likes press for change, the other likes me too and times up a campaign that tells the misogynists that the clock has run out on sexual assault, harassment and inequality in the workplace. Times up for misogyny, times up for harassment, times up for unequal pay, times up for inequality. Times up is not a slogan, it is a directive. I ask my colleagues here today what they will do to press for progress. I remind everyone that we still have a bit of time in hand if people feel the urge to make interventions. Claudia Beamish is to be followed by Gillian Martin. Thank you, Presiding Officer, and today on International Women's Day, may I say that it's great to see a woman presiding over us. History, though, is written by the winners. For as long as we have been living in a patriarchal society, the winners have been men. In a room of one's own, Virginia Woolf wrote, the majority of women are neither harlots nor courtesans, which I heartily agree with. Nor do they sit clasping pug dogs to dusty velvet all through a summer afternoon. But what do they do? All the dinners are cooked, the plates and cups washed, the children sent to school and gone out into the world. No biography or history has a word to say about it. However, when Oscar winner Frances McDormand invited women to stand up and be visible because their stories should be told, it made me think of my countless sisters who have been invisible in Scotland and across the world. International Women's Day is here to celebrate and create a space for women, where our stories should and must be told. Today, to misquote Rapal, we celebrate her history, her story rather, sorry. The fight for women's equality is intertwined with the history of the labour movement. Working-class women like Selina Miller, a suffragist and mill worker from the north of England, put it best when she said, women did not want the vote as a mere play thing, but I quote, every woman is longing for her political freedom in order to make the lot of the worker pleasanter and to bring about reforms. Emilyne Pankhurst is one of the founding members of the Labour Party, a movement that agreed with her when she said that she hoped that our movement might be the means of writing every political and social wrong. Of course it is not, it is across the parties and those in no party at all who do this. However, I am proud of the Labour movement history. As the cabinet secretary said today, there are MSPs today who are going to commemorate Mary Barber with the unveiling of her statue in Glasgow. As Glasgow's first Scottish female councillor, who also led the South Government Women's Housing Association during the Glasgow rent strikes of 1915, actively organising tenant committees and eviction resistance, which cannot have been easy, women here in Scotland and across the world have always stood up for the rights of others, writing themselves into history in the process. Ida B. Wells, one of my mother's country women, was one of the first ever investigative journalists in the USA. She wrote about and led an anti-lynching crusade in the United States in the 1890s. Travelling as a black woman to the southern states is a hugely dangerous undertaking, while Jim Crow laws were in full force. From Austin to Bronte, from Bronte to Elliott, from Elliott to Angelo and Sarah Waters, women's writing is seen as the very best in our literary history. Why, after 100 years, is it that Ida B. Wells is still in the minority of women journalists? She broke the ground and her voice and work has echoes in today's zero-tolerance right to end violence awards, which happen every year here in our Parliament and which drives up standards in journalism by rewarding those committed to further, to the cause of gender equality through their work. However, zero-tolerance yesterday, whose 25th anniversary we celebrate this year, reminded us that the portrayal of women and girls in the media has direct influence on people's attitudes and behaviour. While we all know this, media monitoring by the charity shows that a skewed and dangerous perspective of nine major newspapers expose people to the wrong sort of language and language matters. It is distressing that this year, major newspapers are still reporting such grievous crimes as rape and sexual assault as sex, failing to set the story and the scale and the context of violence against women and giving sensationalised and graphic descriptions. Part of the solution, of course, is the employment of more women journalists. However, whatever agenda, there is a collective responsibility to speak in the right language. I am pleased that, at the last awards that many of us here today attended, the NUJ Scotland highlighted this importance and supported the awards. I spoke of Virginia Woolf at the beginning of this short speech. She discussed what it would take to have more female writers. She said, a room of one zone and £500 a year—perhaps that's gone up a bit now, but anyway. In doing so, she summed up that women will only achieve equality through economic independence. It was a Labour Government that put her words into law in the Equal Pay Act of the 1970s, but, as others have highlighted, we are nowhere near where we should be with that still. The fight has not ended by any means. We, as a Parliament, do have the power, as highlighted by both Rhoda, my friend and colleague and Richard Leonard today, to help some of the most marginalised women in Scotland through economic agency, requiring ministers to bring forward regulations that will ensure that the payments of universal credit are automatically split between both members of a couple. That would, I think, be particularly helpful to women in an abusive relationship and give financial empowerment. I am very grateful to Ms Beamish for giving away in what is a hugely important and sensitive matter. I think that we are at one on this. The point that the First Minister was making this afternoon is that, while we are supportive and indeed we are of split payments, we rely on getting the agreement of the DWP to do it, and then we would have to pay them. I hope that members across the Benches can encourage their colleagues in the Houses of Commons to support the member's bill, where we can deal with the issue at source and for all women across the UK. I welcome that intervention, because part of the issue is that good women and good men work together across the chamber and beyond and on a global basis on those issues. I am sure that we will reach a resolution on it. We must. As Virginia Woolf said, the experience of the mass is behind a single voice. It may not seem like a great act in history to do this together. It is just a small change, but many such small changes made by women to ensure our safety and economic equality have turned our fine words on international women's day, year after year, into tangible actions. Let us do this and so much more together. Gillian Martin, Follow by Alison Johnstone My speech today should have been the easiest to write, because my speech last year was one of the easiest to have ever written, but this year and this week it wasn't. I was going to use my whole six minutes talking about my project to map a tourist trail around Scotland recognising the women who have shaped Scotland, and I will get on to that, but I just couldn't stand up today and not talk about the continued and distressingly all-too-close-to-home subject of sexual harassment of women. I am all for free speech, but I find myself wanting to erase phrases from our discourse around the rights women have to feel safe, unimpeded and respected in the workplace in particular. One such phrase is, it's only banter. Maybe to the person delivering it who thinks he's been the most hilarious man in the planet, yes it is, but to the woman on the receiving end, who's too polite to say what she really thinks, or feels that to speak vociferously would put her at risk, no it's not banter. They are words that diminish, control, objectify, insult, embarrass and distress. Outright abuse, obvious, unwanted physical contact is horrific but it is not the only type of abuse. Insidious, sustained, thinly veiled sexual comments are not to be ignored and they have a pernicious and cumulative effect. You worry you'll not be believed, you know you'll be told you're overreacting, you know people will question your complaints validity, you'll find it hard to put across the effect they've had on you, but you'll also lie awake at night wondering how you can escape it, whether that's leaving your job, making arrangements, never to be in that person's company or voicing your complaints in a way which you know might weep the whirlwind. On this day I wear purple, the colour of feminism and stand with all women who've ever felt abused, diminished, controlled by persistent insidious workplace harassment. Because I was one of you and even as many as 25 years on from my harassment, I still think about what I could have done to stop it and how hard it was to take any action and I salute those who in the last year were braver than me and who have. Now I can get on to talking about my project. Claudia Beamish has already said that history is written by the winners but I actually think it's more accurate to say history is written by the patriarchy and some of the proof of that is on our high streets. You look up and there's a statue of a general, a king, a male writer, a male poet, a Glasgow traffic cone does not sit upon the head of a bronzed hairbun of a suffragette that sits upon the shortback and sides of a military man. There are simply not enough landmarks to represent the women who made Scotland and those that are there should be given more importance. That's why today I'm pleased to say that I'm playing a small part to help those many people who've dedicated their lives to giving Scotland's women the recognition they deserve by working with Visit Scotland and the others to generate a tourist map of the existing landmarks of influential Scottish women. Excuse me but also asking the public including everyone here in this chamber to get in touch with me to get more information on Scotland and women's history that they would like to see recognised who aren't already and I thank Glasgow women's library who've already been in touch to help me with this project today. I'm sad to say that there's not one statue of a woman in my constituency but in the neighbouring constituency of Bamshire and Bucking Coast there's Fisher Jesse, the beautiful statue of a Peterhead fishseller and her child. To me she's a symbol of the juggling act, caring for a child by her side as she works, humping her basket of fish or shawl across her shoulders and representing the ordinary northeast women who were the engine of a country. I was delighted to see that the statue of the hero of the Glasgow rent strikes Mary Barber and other she led was unveiled today in Govan but in our capital city we have more statues of animals than of women despite the existence of great Edinburgh women like Muriel Spark or Elsie Engels. Of course my colleague Fiona Hyslop was instrumental in getting a plaque to Sophia Jax Blake, the leader of the Edinburgh Seven who along with Isabel Thorne, Edith Pettie, Matilda Chapton, Helen Evans, Mary Anderson and Emily Bovell were amongst the first women to be admitted into a university in the UK. They were stalked and harassed by male students and a mob of 200 rioted outside surgeons hall when the women arrived for an exam. The university ultimately refused to grant them degrees but in 1899, after the efforts of the Edinburgh Seven and active parliament sanctioned degrees for women. I'd also like to put on record my support for the campaign in Ayrshire where my friend Ruth Maguire is involved with to get a monument to recognise the many women victimised by the Scottish Witch Trials. I think that that's part of women's history in Scotland that's seriously overlooked. On my own constituency—because I always mention my own constituency—we could do with more recognition of Strickin's own Lorna Doon, who was a novelist and Hollywood screenwriter at the cinema industry's infancy. I'd like to think that Lorna Doon was behind the sort of people like Francis Madornan who stood up and made a speech that he did that was referenced there earlier. I'd also be delighted to see suffragett Caroline Phillips recognised. These are women who didn't do things to be commemorated with plaques and statues, but they changed our world and they should be recognised. Dr Alison McCall, the convener of Women's History Scotland, said that women's underrepresentation in the civic landscape has been partly due to the way that these women viewed themselves. She says, A lot of the women, we would want to honour a woman who saw a problem and set about solving it. They didn't donate their diaries to an archive because they were never thinking of their own personal glorification, but glorify we must because they inspire others. Evening out women's representation is just another part of the jigsaw that will address women's inequality. Carl Allison-Johnston, to be followed by Sandra White. So, here we are, International Women's Day 2018. As Christina McKelvie and others have noted, the World Economic Forum's 2017 global gender gap report tells us that gender parity is still over 200 years away. It is absolutely right then that this year's theme is press for progress, as women have waited far too long already. Haven't we just? This International Women's Day, we are asked to commit to specifically concentrate on five specific actions to press for progress for gender parity in our own sphere of influence. On that sphere of influence, I am proud to be involved in women 50-50. I believe that it is a good example of using the reach that we as parliamentarians have to demonstrate our commitment to gender parity and to all who are listening to this debate. If you haven't yet joined us, then please do. But more on those specific actions, we're called at this International Women's Day to maintain a gender parity mindset. If such a mindset was adopted, welfare reform wouldn't be aimed almost exclusively at women as if they were a target for cuts. On a more positive note, the Scottish Women's Budget Group, I believe, are that gender parity mindset in action. We're called upon, too, to challenge stereotypes and bias, and I welcome the light that is being shone on some of the darkest corners of this bias through campaigns like me, too. We're called on to influence others' beliefs and actions. Again, women 50-50 is working hard to explain why lack of women in representative politics, in our boardrooms, on our public bodies matters. I want people to ask when they're watching FMQs or following proceedings in our town halls, why are there so few women in here, where are they, and I would say to anyone sitting in the gallery that the chamber doesn't normally have this particular gender balance. We know that girls are doing well in school and young women are excelling in our universities, so why are they not here in greater numbers, helping to shape the laws that shape our country? We're asked, too, to forge positive visibility of women. That is something that we can do, and we do do, thank you colleagues. Finally, we're asked to celebrate women's achievements, and I believe that we need to get much, much better at doing that, because celebrating those achievements will help us to achieve those other four asks. I'm delighted on this international women's day to celebrate, firstly, some very recent achievements at last week's world athletics indoor championships. The British team won seven medals. They won medals in seven events, but they won 10 medals in all because the women's 4x4 team won bronze. Women won nine of the 10 medals, and four of those nine medals were hard won by the incredible efforts of Scotland's Laura Muir, who won silver and bronze over two events, and Ailey Doyle, who won her first global individual medal with bronze in the 400 metres, and our own Zoe Clark and that 4x4 team. Those women are incredible role models. Laura won't be competing in the Commonwealth Games. We'll be watching that very soon, but she won't be competing because she's completing her veterinary degree. Ailey Doyle, who recently spoke at Scottish Athletics event in this Parliament, is a qualified PE teacher, and her positive influence has been recognised with her inclusion in the Young Women's Movement Scotland list of 30 inspiring women under 30. I'm proud to report that that inspirational list includes the first green councillor in the east end of Glasgow, councillor Kim Long. Now, councillor Kim rises to a challenge, like all the other women that we celebrate today, and she tells us that, as a teenager, I really hated PE, but I went on to play hockey for Scotland. She was the moderator of the National Youth Assembly and she pushed for young people's voices to be embedded in decision making processes. She became the first ever young person to be on a special commission, the special commission on same-sex relationships and ministry, and you can read her for many achievements, but she says that my personal highlight was when I got a bunch of men in Barlinnie to sing in three-part harmony. She regards that as one of her stand-out achievements. She says, too, that I want to see girls and young women taking up space, whether that's physically or vocally, in boardrooms, sports pitches, stages and classrooms, really wherever they want to be, but taking up space. We need collective empowerment as colleagues have recognised, but it's also about realising that some people will face even greater challenges because of the structures that we live in. As Claudia Beamish said, history is indeed written by the winners, and Kim was at the unveiling of the statue of Mary Barber in Glasgow today. It's obviously long overdue, and if the gender gap is bad, the gender statue gap highlights how we have been really, really poor. We've not been good to put it mildly. It's celebrating women's achievements. I'm the deputy convener of the cross-party group on animal welfare. I am passionate about animals. I am very pleased that we have a statue of a bear and a dog in this wonderful city, but we can do much better when it comes to gender representation if that's the way we want to continue to mark people and their achievements. Another young woman on that 30 under 30 list is the writer Kirstie Strickland. She's won awards for her writing on violence against women and she's judged on this subject too. She too speaks about the need for women to be confident enough to take up space. Kirstie Strickland says, I've struggled with imposter syndrome in the past, wasted far too much time wondering about whether I'm good enough or clever enough or brave enough to do the things that I want to do in life. For young women, your time is precious. Please don't waste a second of worrying that you aren't good enough. You are. Take up space, make yourself heard, know your worth and go out and achieve your potential. Know that, while you're doing that, other women are rooting you on and delighted to see you succeeding. A young woman who's not on that list deserves a special mention. That's only a list of 30. We know there are tens of thousands of young women who should be on that list. Catherine Gemell of the Marine Conservation Society has done fabulous work when it comes to the reduction of plastics in Scotland through her enthusiasm and her passion, and I know many of you in this building will have met her. Finally, Presiding Officer, if I may, this is International Women's Day, and I'd like to draw attention to the work of the Kenyan activist and a personal heroine of mine, Wangari Matai. She died in 2011, and I didn't know much about her, but the Kenyan Scot community in Edinburgh invited me to plant trees in Figot Park just a couple of miles from here. With them, she was the founder of the Greenbelt movement, and they've now planted more than 51 million trees in Kenya, conserving the environment, providing employment for women, reducing poverty, and she said, it's the little thing that citizens do. That's what will make the difference. My little thing is planting trees. Presiding Officer, let our little thing be a refusal to accept the status quo, to challenge it in all we do, to work together until women in Scotland and across the globe have our long overdue equality. I call Sandra White to be followed by Alex Cole-Hamilton. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. I could just reply to Alison Johnstone, and this little thing will certainly not let it rest in certain aspects. Having been born and brought up in Govan, I listened to my granny and my aunties, etc. I'm incredibly proud that we have that statue at last, as has been said before. There are so many fantastic women, and we should honour them. I congratulate everyone who has spoken previously. I think that they have done a fantastic job, as the women past and present are doing also. I want to quote from the motion, which is really important that we do that. The one part that I want to quote is that the Parliament unites an international women's day to reaffirm its commitment to upholding and protecting the rights of women and girls, which are fundamental human rights. I think that that is something that we should repeat constantly. Imagine having to say that, fundamental human rights, because it affects women and girls. I think that that should be repeated constantly. There are many women that I could talk about from my past, from Margaret Ewing to various other political figures, but I want to talk about a number of areas in my constituency. I'm just getting used to those glasses. I'm going to take them off now, actually. They're really annoying me, and my sight seems to have improved slightly at that particular point. I want to talk about the fantastic work that's going on in my constituency. One of the first ones was a young girl who came to see me, who was a student and went from success to success. That is Femmeng. It's a network aimed at linking together females in the School of Engineering at the University of Glasgow. The group has a number of focusses, including outreach work with schools, networking events with industry professionals, social activity and international collaboration. Femmeng was started as a subgroup within the Glasgow University Engineering Society by a young lady called Ellen Simmons, who came into my constituency office in Argyll Street in Glasgow to tell me about that fantastic project. She was just so enthused with it and her ideas, and we just took it from there and met the other students there. The network really did go and has went from centre to centre since 2015, when it was first announced. In 2016, Femmeng became formally affiliated with the Women's Engineering Society and established a fantastic collaborative relationship with society ever since. Since the early days, one of the aims is to take their message into the wider community around Glasgow and beyond. They have found that pupils are often unaware of the vast ranges of disciplines that can be studied in higher education and sometimes struggle to see how their skills could be applied to the engineering industry. That is where Femmeng are really very successful. They offer informative presentations about the different engineering disciplines, what life is like as a student, advice for pupils about applying to university, and they have strong links with colleges and deliver campus tours and presentations for visiting groups. They do not necessarily mentor, but they certainly support women who want to get in and young women in particular who want to get into engineering. They believe that one of the main deterrents for female studying or considering to study engineering is a lack of positive role models in the industry. That is where Ellen and her friends and her fellow students come into it. They aim to bridge the gap between the university student and the industry professionals. They give students an idea of where they can take them. One of the ways in which they do so is by hosting informal networking events, which they call Future U. At those events, they invite successful female industry professionals, alumni, and they give a brief presentation answering various questions about how they get to where they are now. They are building up the confidence of the young engineering students. In 2016, I thought that that was an absolutely fantastic idea and it has been very successful. The group successfully pioneered Femmeng in Rwanda. The university's first student-led learning project in collaboration with the University of Rwanda. If people want to think back at the genocides in Rwanda, there were lots of men killed, so there were very many women there and not as many men. They did that in Rwanda and the initiative brought together female engineering students. The university was a common goal of encouraging more high school girls in Rwanda to pursue their further education in STEM. It went from strength to strength, and I wish them all the success for the future. I want to mention another girl who is studying at Glasgow University, who has been mentioned by Alison Johnstone, Ms Laura Muir. She has won seven medals, including two gold medals, her most recent victories at World Indoor Championship in Birmingham, where she won silver and bronze. She also won the Sport Award and the Inspiring City Awards last year. A collaboration of people made Glasgow, the Herald and the Glasgow Chamber of Commerce, and she is a fantastic role model that has already been said for young people. Is it going to be an ample time if you feel obliged to take Mr Doris? I am absolutely happy. I am delighted that you have done it because I would like to mention that another remarkable lady had the opportunity to meet the other day Sylvia Douglas, who runs the organisation, the social enterprise Miss Miss Missies, based in Benview Street, just between both of our constituencies. That organisation works to capacity build and empower women in my constituency across north Glasgow, particularly focusing on deprived communities. I thought that that would be a good opportunity to put on record the great work that they do, and I hope that there are similar organisations across the country that could do similar work particularly in deprived communities. It is all right. You will make up your time for that intervention. Thank you very much. I thank Bob Doris for that, and perhaps I look forward to doing a joint visit with the group, because it is absolutely fantastic to do that. I cannot finish this without mentioning the Glasgow girls, as they have already been mentioned by the Cabinet Secretary. I and I, Christy McKelver, was involved from the very, very beginning. We have to mention and pay tribute to Ewan Girfen, who was the head teacher at Drumchappel High, who got those girls together and gave them such a fantastic amount of courage to go forward. We know the story of the various things that happened about the dawn rays and how they were absolutely fantastic in what they did, particularly the seven young women about the high light and the poor treatment of asylum seekers. However, if I can perhaps go on just a wee bit further in regard to what happened to some of the asylum girls, the Glasgow girls. I am Marlon Rosa, and I still meet them socially. I still go in demos, as you might call it, with them as well. They are still very much involved in social justice. In fact, Rosa went on to study politics at Strathclyde University, law and politics at Strathclyde University, and indeed Rosa, as well, stood as an SNP candidate in the last local council elections, and came very, very close to winning. I think that that just shows you the courage that those young girls had. It makes up the whole thing about, basically, that women should support women. The Glasgow girls are Marlon Rosa in particular, who, as I say, I still know, are just, you know, a beacon for what women can actually do when they get the encouragement. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. Thank you, Ms White. I call Alex Cole-Hamilton to be followed by Claire Hawkey. Mr Cole-Hamilton, please. Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. I am very grateful for the opportunity to speak in this important debate and, indeed, for the consensus around the Government's motion today. My life has been filled with the impact of extraordinary women. Their impression on my world has been profound, and I want to focus on one in particular in my remarks today. In April 1940, my great-aunt Joan worked as foreign office intelligence in the British legation to Oslo. She stood side by side with celebrated spy chief Frank Foley, burning intercepts and manifests, as Wormacht divisions overran that city. A key member of the Foley group, she then helped to rescue the Norwegian Government and King and escaped overland by car and by foot through the snow, through Lillahammer and on to the coast. From there, after providing vital communication support to Norwegian resistance, she was evacuated by submarine to Britain and was awarded an MBE in the New Year's honours list that year for her service. She was only 23 years old. I wish I had known her. In her short career, she was present at some of the most defining moments in global history. She was part of the delegation to Yalta. I can only imagine the diplomat she would have gone on to become had she not been sadly lost to us when her plane disappeared over the Atlantic on her return journey from the San Francisco Conference, which established the United Nations at the end of the war. When I think about Aunt Joan, I am reminded of the frontiers that she had to push back on as a young woman in a man's world. That in the male dominated landscape of military intelligence, she was decorated and mentioned in dispatches several times, is testimony to the strength of her character and her resilience. I see that strength in the woman in my life today, and I honour them for it. In the year that has passed since we last marked this occasion, it has been my great privilege to stand shoulder to shoulder with the Scottish Government and members of all parties in support of the changes that we have delivered in advancing women's rights and gender equality. In landmark domestic violence legislation, in the gender representation on public boards act and in the widespread condemnation of the rape clause, we still have frontiers on which to push back. In the year to come, I hope that we can do more to challenge employers who still engage in maternity discrimination, clothing demands in the workplace or the gender pay gap, which is measured out as nearly 7 per cent across this country. I was very glad to be involved in the UCU protests outside at lunchtime, which, among other things, was still talking about disparity of equal pay in the university and college sector. I want to see the advances that we are making in gender representation on public boards mirrored in the board rooms of private companies as well. I want to see a shift in the imbalance that exists between the fact that, whilst 50 per cent of graduates in this country are female, only one-fifth of UK companies are either led or owned by women. Let this also be the year when we can finally see a modicum of justice for those women born in the 1950s who are the victims of state pension inequality. I am a feminist, but, if I am honest, I do not think that that has always been true. My mother had been in the vanguard of the North American feminist movement in the 1960s, and it always brought me up with an understanding of respect and of equality. But when I think back on it, I spent so many of my formative years blissfully unaware of the privilege that I enjoyed as a boy and as a young man, in the stereotypes that I conformed to and in the advantage that I accepted without question. I was often a happy beneficiary of the patriarchy, and, to my shame, I was at times a passive witness to things such as everyday sexism, systemic injustice and even the harassment that was so eloquently described by Gillian Martin a few moments ago. I am not sure when it was that I woke up to that, but I woke up and, over the past 20 years, I have strived to be both a better man and a better feminist, to live up to the example set to meet people such as my mother, my aunt, my sisters and all of the female role models in my life. I have mentored female candidates within my party, helped to steward all women shortlist through its structures, and I have worked for gender balance in the Liberal Democrats to the point where, as director of our national campaign at the SNAP general election, I helped to reverse an imbalance that has existed since the inception of my party when we returned a group of Scottish MPs to Westminster, half of whom were female. However, it does not stop there. In every debate such as this, I rise with an insignificant degree of embarrassment at the reality that I speak for a group that is made up of parliamentarians that are exclusively male. Therefore, I offer this commitment. I will do everything in my power to ensure that the next group of Liberal Democrat parliamentarians returned to this place, be it big or small, will look more like the society that we seek to represent and less like the Liberal front bench of 1916. International Women's Day affords us the opportunity to reaffirm that shared commitment to gender equality, to take stock of the mountains that we still have to climb in pursuit of that aim, and to recognise that attitudes and complicity, such as those of my younger self, can be turned around. We will hear the words of many great women in today's debate, but I want to leave you with those of a man, Indian movie star Amitav Bachachan, who, like me, woke up to the iniquities of patriarchy that had benefited him so richly. He said, because you are women, people will force their thinking on you, their boundaries on you, they will tell you how to dress and how to behave, who you can meet and where you can go. Don't live in the shadows of people's judgment, make your own choices in the light of your own wisdom. I see the spirit and strength of my aunt Joan, and the many great women that I'm proud to share this chamber with in those words, and with that, Presiding Officer, I commend the motion to this chamber. Thank you very much, Mr Cole-Hamilton. I now call Clare Hockey to be followed by Maurice Corry. Ms Hockey, please. Thank you, Presiding Officer. International Women's Day is just as important now as ever, and I'm sure that this year's Awareness Day will help to progress the cause for true gender equality. Presiding Officer, when I look around us in this chamber today, I am so proud to see many strong women beside me. My female colleagues across political divides show each and every day that politics is now very much the business of women. However, looking back at UK political representation throughout history, it's staggering that, since 1918, only 489 women have been elected as members of the House of Commons. To put this into context, until December 2016, there had been fewer women MPs ever than there were men elected to the House of Commons at any one time. We sit in a Parliament that's composition is now 35 per cent female, and while that demonstrates that things are moving in the right direction, we are still far from reaching gender parity. People look to our Parliament as an example, therefore I look forward to its future when it better reflects Scotland's wider society. Presiding Officer, women of my age and younger have been afforded greater opportunities in their lives than our predecessors, be that in education, in the workplace or elsewhere. This is thanks to the generations of women and men who before us advocated and fought for gender equality and parity of opportunity. In his message marking International Women's Day two years ago, former Secretary General to the UN, Bankie Moon, said that, as a society, we have shattered so many glass ceilings, we've created a carpet of shards. Now we are sweeping away the assumptions and the bias of the past so women can advance across new frontiers. As an MSP, I see it as my role and indeed my duty to continue to fight the fight of our mothers and grandmothers before us and address current inequalities for the benefit of women and girls in the future. Society may be fairer and more equal now than ever before, however the progress has not moved swiftly enough and women still face a number of injustices today. As my colleague Gillian Martin so movingly spoke about, we continue to be subjected to sexism and sexual harassment. As Alison Johnson mentioned, we are adversely affected by welfare reforms and we still continue to face massive barriers at work. Notwithstanding pregnancy and maternity discrimination, sexual harassment in the workplace, or the fact that women are more than three times as likely to be working part-time when women do work, they are often paid less than men. Last year was a year of the BBC gender pay gap controversy, which revealed stark differences in salaries of public figures. However, that is not an issue that is unique to the media or the celebrity world. The gender pay gap impacts upon almost every workforce across the UK. More women than ever before are working in professional high-ranking jobs, but what use is it when their pay is often less than their equivalent male counterparts? According to research by Opportunity Now campaign, in the UK for every pound of man-earns, a woman takes home 81 pence. As a committed trade unionist myself, and I truly refer members to my register of interests and that I am a member of unison, it continues to be a real source of personal frustration that women continue to lose out in the workplace. Since 1997, the gender pay gap in Scotland has narrowed considerably from 26.5 per cent to 16.1 per cent in 2017. However, 16.1 per cent is 16.1 per cent too many. Anipsos Mori Paul recently conducted asked respondents when they thought that pay and economic equality would be achieved. The average answer of the participants was the year 2035. Members will not be surprised to hear that 2035 is a bit on the optimistic side, with the World Economic Forum suggesting that at the current rate, women are likely to reach economic parity with men in 2234. I doubt very much that I will be about to see that. There are many drivers of the gender pay gap, however sadly not one particular solution to closing it. As with many of the injustices that women face, some barriers are systematic and cultural and will sadly take generations to unravel. However, many of the proactive measures taken by the Scottish Government will go some way in making Scotland more equal for our young women in the future. For example, through the recent changes to the Equality Act 2010, an amendment to that legislation now forces public authorities to report their gender pay gap and publish equal pay statements if employing more than 20 people, which is down from 150 employees previously. Furthermore, through the implementation of the developing the Young Workforce Scotland's youth employment strategy, it will address gender imbalances in young people's careers choices and opportunities, and also by continuing to push employers to become living wage accredited. It is not right that over 100,000 more women than men earn less than their living wage in Scotland. However, the Government has ensured that Scotland already has the highest proportion of employees paid the living wage of any country in the UK. Presiding Officer, International Women's Day should act as a renewed impetus for us all. We must continue to work together to close gender inequality, not only for ourselves but for the generations to follow. Today, just over 100 years on, women not having the right to vote is now viewed as a ludicrous idea, old-fashioned history. I look forward to the day when gender inequality is seen as something that would happen in the olden days, as my kids would say—an outdated concept that is consigned to the history books. As the motion alludes to this Scotland's year of the young people, so we owe it to them to do all that we can to create a fairer and more equal society. As evidence in the other speeches today, focusing on the me too and the time's up movements, we are hopefully witnessing profound changes in our world, and for the most part, women are leading the way. I fully agree with Claire Hockey's comments that we are surrounded by strong women here today. I am lucky enough to have the same at home with my wife and three daughters. I welcome the opportunity to speak today as we celebrate women and girls around the world on International Women's Day, whilst it is a day for celebrating the accomplishments and progress that we have made. It is also a day for recognising that the progress is still left to be made. Globally, the female population continues to face inequality and injustices in nearly all aspects of life from health and education to career opportunities to domestic abuse. Issues of inequality in the workplace, lack of political representation, gender biases and sexual harassment continue to persist in society. We have certainly come a long way over the past 40 years from when I worked on the cotton mills and paisley, where women mill workers were not allowed to wear trousers. Also, if they became engaged to be married, they had to leave the company. Gosh, what an improvement today. Campaigns like me too, movement and time's up, which have been mentioned, have added momentum to the push for equality that women deserve. Women are feeling more empowered to speak about their experiences with inequality. We must take this opportunity to listen to women and girls to try and understand the injustices that they face and find solutions to achieve equality. We all know that there are areas of Scottish society where we must improve. In education and training here in Scotland, there has been a 47 per cent decline in the number of women enrolled in college in Scotland, while the fall amongst men over the same time period has been only 25 per cent. Only 5 per cent of those starting STEM apprenticeships in 2016-17 were female. In the political world, women make up 50 per cent of the population. However, they only make up 35 per cent of MSPs and 24 per cent of local councillors. We, the Scottish Conservatives, recognise that this is an area that we ourselves need to improve in. That is why last year, my colleague Annie Wells launched the Women to Win Scotland campaign, where women in this Conservative party can receive the campaign training, network and financial support that they need to run a successful campaign. More recently in the last week, we have also launched a new diversity commission under the direction of Baroness Mabarec MEP to increase the number of women and minority candidates running under the Conservative banner for seats in the next Parliament. Over the last 10 years or more, in the armed forces, we have seen more women taking up front-line operational roles on land, sea and in the air. Further, we have seen more senior command roles being achieved as well, and that is only to be commended. Now, Deputy Presiding Officer, I am going to move on to a slightly different topic, that of the commonwealth women parliamentarians, or CWP, which is set up in the late 1980s. It is a network of women's members of the commonwealth parliamentary associations parliaments and legislatures. The CWP, as it is called, as an integral part of the commonwealth parliamentary association or CPA, is working for better representation for women in legislatures and also for the furtherance of gender equality across the commonwealth. The CWP network provides a means of building the capacity of women elected to Parliament to be more effective in their roles, improving the awareness and ability of all parliamentarians, male and female, and encouraging them to include a general perspective, a gender perspective, in all aspects of their role, in legislation, oversight and representation, and in helping overseas Governments and commonwealth Governments to achieve and become gender sensitive institutions. The Scotland branch chaired the first meeting of the British Islands and Edithranian region CWP steering committee in September 2013 and held the first regional CWP conference in March 2014. My colleague Mark Mitchell is a CPA Scotland branch representative on the CWP regional steering committee. The CWP recognised that, additionally, women have been the main drivers of change in gender equality. However, while women are by far the strongest advocates of general equality, all parliamentarians and parliaments as institutions also have a role and the CWP appealed to branches within the CPA to appoint male champions. That is why the CWP requested that CPA branches should nominate a male parliamentarian to act as a CWP male champion. I recently volunteered for that role with a strong encouragement of my wife and my daughters to be truthful. However, in its infancy, I am looking forward to developing this role in the future for this Parliament and working with other members from all sides of the chamber in that role and other CWP male champions in the region and elsewhere. As I was coming to the debate this afternoon, I was told in fact that I understand that this Parliament is the first Parliament in the European Union to appoint a CWP male champion. This year's theme for International Women's Day is the press for progress, and I understand everyone to do that and urge them to do so. Press for progress in education, encourage women to go to college and to pursue careers in STEM, press for progress in the workplace and to close the wage gap and to end stigmas that suggest that women cannot hold executive positions. In conclusion, we need to press for progress in government, empower women to run for office and listen to their ideas and experience that will be able to bring about real productive change and in creating equality for women. It is the experience of women that need to be at the forefront of this equality movement and therefore they need to be present and active in the forums in which change will be enacted. While International Women's Day is only a single day in the year, the sentiment last year round and we must continue to make progress in achieving equality for all, and I wish you all a happy International Women's Day today. Thank you, Mr Corey. I call Rona Mackay to be followed by Michelle Ballantyne. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I am absolutely delighted to speak in this debate on International Women's Day to talk about inspirational and amazing women who have shaped our society and contributed so much. As we have heard from all sides of the chamber today, we have come a long way since the days when the suffragettes and suffragettes fought so hard and sacrificed so much to win the right to vote, something that we all now take for granted and even my generation can't believe it was once denied to us. Today, along with talented and world-renowned women, I would like to give credit to the inspirational women who do not make a name for themselves with their inventions or their heroic deeds. We have heard a lot about those women from other colleagues in their speeches. Inspirational women are all around us in our everyday lives. For me, my gran and my mother were amazing influences on how I grew up, which I know is not unusual. Their values and unconditional love gave me the security and values from which I benefit to this day. However, as we know, not all children have the good fortune to grow up with inspirational role models in their lives. That is why, the more we learn about ACEs, adverse childhood experiences, the more we can help people to live happier lives. For several years, I wrote a feature called Forgotten Heroes, for a magazine highlighting the amazing contributions largely overlooked Scots that had made to the world throughout the centuries. However, I had to dig long and hard to find profiles of Scottish heroines of which I knew there were many. That has sadly been the case until recently. Women were virtually airbrushed from history. Women like Elsie Ingalls, founder of the Scottish Women's Hospitals, heirs Marion Gray, a mathematician who influenced the telecom giants of today. Geologist Marion Gordon from Aberdeen, zoologist Muriel Robertson. I could go on, Presiding Officer, but time won't allow, and my colleagues Gail Ross and Gillian Martin mentioned a lot more. Thankfully, the anomaly is changing, and it is great to hear about Gillian Martin's excellent project. A few weeks ago, I visited a school to record a video with pupils aged around 12 to 14 to talk about inspirational women. They are also holding an event tomorrow to celebrate International Women's Day, which I will be attending. I was asked by one boy who my inspirational women were. After I had mentioned family and certain politicians, I said Rosa Parks, the First Lady of Civil Rights, who refused to give up her seat to a white passenger on a bus in Alabama 1955. I honestly did not think that they would have heard of her, but to my delight they all nodded and said that they were doing a project honour at that time. The next question that I was asked was if I could bring back either suffragette Emily Davidson or Jane Haining, who saved thousands of Jews during the Holocaust, who would it be? An impossible question. I told them that I honestly could not choose because each had contributed so much, but it was fabulous that they knew about those wonderful women. So where are we today? While we are getting there, but there is still a long way to go in our fight for equality. It is entirely fitting that a statue of Mary Barber has been unveiled today in Glasgow. As we heard, she led thousands of women through the streets of Govan to fight for fair rents during the 1915 rent strike and campaigned for women's access to reproductive and sexual health, a social pioneer and inspirational woman in the truest sense. Today, the Scottish Government has a proud record of promoting women's equality, such as ensuring greater trade pay transparency, increasing early learning and childcare provision to record levels and working with the Equality and Human Rights Commission to challenge pregnancy and maternity discrimination. We are also setting ambitious targets to increase the gender minority share in the most imbalanced college subject groups and modern apprenticeship frameworks, improving women's representation on boards throughout the introduction of the gender representation on public boards bill and the women's 50-50 campaign and other initiatives. Today, we fight on to banish the gender pay gap, gain equal access to the boardroom and finalise equal pay claims. We fight on for an end to sexual harassment and bullying at work. We fight on for an end to violence against women. We fight on for our rights to LGBT women and for free sanitary products and much, much more. Those things should not have to be fought for. They are our rights and in 2018 gender equality and respect should be a given, so we will not give up until that is achieved. Today, I would like to celebrate all women, mums, grands, aunts, sisters and carers, women who are an inspiration to someone somewhere. To the many amazing women who work in the third sector, such as Dr Marcia Scott of Scottish Women's Aid, Karen McCluskey, chief executive of community justice Scotland, who have done and continued to do such crucial work in protecting and improving the lives of women, and there are many, many more women in the third sector who really deserve a shout out. We should celebrate how far we have come but know that there is much more to do so that our daughters and granddaughters are shown the respect and best possible future that they deserve, then our work and that of our pioneering sisters will be done. Thank you very much. I call Michelle Ballantyne to be followed by Kate Forbes, Ms Ballantyne. Throughout my life, I have been inspired by a number of influential women who have each helped to change the world in their own way. As I look back at some of these women in the run-up today, it became very clear that women have been defying the odds successfully and unapologetically for centuries. Today in Scotland, we as women no longer face the barriers that we did even 50 years ago and we undoubtedly have fewer odds stacked against us. There are, of course, still challenges and barriers here and across the world where women are objectified, abused or oppressed, such as some of those highlighted across the chamber today. However, in this country, we now have a generation of young girls who can see strong independence at successful women as normal. Gwendolyn Brooks, police surprise-winning author, poet and teacher, taught me that sometimes you have to tell people things that they do not want to hear. As she put it, truth tellers are not always palatable. We have spent the last century successfully working to redress the gender balance in this country, and I welcome that, but we must be equally careful that we do not press too far. An article in The Times this week raised a very pertinent issue that resonated strongly with me. Should we really be worried that more boys go into engineering and more girls go on to be nurses? I believe the answer is yes, only if there are barriers preventing them from doing differently. It is the barriers that we must address. I have a son who is a tree surgeon, I have a son who is a soldier, I have a son who is an engineer and a son who is an economist. I have a daughter who is a primary teacher and a young daughter who tells me she wants to get married and have children. Did I fail as a parent for not pushing them to break the gender stereotypes? I do not believe so. Eleanor Roosevelt declared, do what you feel in your heart to be right, for you will be criticised anyway, you will be damned if you do and damned if you do not. By all means we should encourage young girls to find their passion and ensure that whatever it may be she can achieve it. However, we must also be careful not to push too far. If a young girl wants to keep house and be a mum, then we should respect and applaud that choice too. Girls in Scotland are now 56 per cent more likely to apply for university than their male counterparts. Perhaps I hope that the cabinet secretary would like to congratulate me, Glasgow Medical School, who tweeted today that in 1933, 16 per cent of their graduates were female, but in 2017, 71 per cent of their graduates were female. That, by any standard, is a phenomenal change and phenomenal progress for women. Of course, I welcome the drive for girls to achieve academically, but I do worry sometimes that we are no longer pursuing gender parity in this country. Instead, the promotion of women rights is in danger of coming to mean the demotion of men. We have a responsibility to all our children and all our young people to be strong role models, whether male or female, and to encourage them to strive to achieve all they can, irrespective of gender. Women in Scotland have more freedom than ever to determine their own futures, and we should absolutely celebrate that. However, on International Women's Day— Emma Harper. I would like to ask Michelle Ballantyne, if she would agree that the launch of the Women in Agriculture Task Force last June at the Royal Highland show is a great way to highlight that Joyce Campbell and Fergus Ewing are heading that, and it is a great way to highlight the important contribution that women make in agriculture. Michelle Ballantyne? Absolutely. I think that during the wars, when women went on to the land as farm girls and proved that they could do the job equally to men, that was the beginning of an enormous change for women. As I said, I want to see women able to do whatever they want to do. It is the barriers that we take down, and all the actions that we take should be about removing the barriers and allowing girls and boys to compete equally for whatever job they wish to do. I would like to continue for a bit, but you can come back in a bit. However, what I want to say is that on International Women's Day, we must turn our focus to the women who remain second-class citizens, and the theme this year is press for progress for them. There are horrific cases of violence against women, abuse and persecution based on gender that are still too common across the world. Often those who are most at risk are also those who are already marginalised, and it is therefore issues beyond gender that we should also be addressing. In a number of cultures, the education and health of women is deemed as inconsequential, and when I first trained in London, many of our patients that came in, their husbands spoke for them and the women were not allowed to have a voice, not even allowed to speak our language to talk about the issues that they had. Often they are degraded further than that by the violence and abuse that they receive, and therefore it seemed radical in the 1960s when King Faisal of Saudi Arabia introduced public education for girls, yet in just a few years, even the most traditional Saudis were sending their daughters to school. New norms can be established and new norms must be established. Religion and culture are often major factors preventing the establishment of women's rights. However, in an agent interconnectivity, where the majority of the population has immediate access to international events and ideas, it will be more and more difficult to stand in the way of a global shift towards equality. Just last year in Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman changed several laws to grant women more freedoms, freedoms that in most countries we would take for granted, but it was an acknowledgement that holding on to the ultra-traditionalist culture was, in his words, not normal. This is a small step, but it is evidence of a large-scale systematic shift occurring globally. Press for progress will not topple kingdoms of countries that reject the equality of women. However, it can help to add pressure and move to establish a global norm of gender parity. With each country that acknowledges gender equality, we come a small step closer to a global community where men and women are equal. There will come a time when it is no longer in the interests of a leader to deny gender equality, especially as men and women come to stand together on this issue. Michelle Obama made the point in her New Hampshire speech, which resonated around the globe that strong men, men who are truly role models, and Alex Cole-Hamilton perhaps made that point very strongly, do not need to put down women to make themselves powerful. The more the idea of equality spreads, the more difficult it will become to refute. Movements such as the times up campaign have helped to fuel an international conversation. Can I just stop you there because your time is up? I joined the speech, but I am sorry if I had seven minutes and forty seconds. Can I call Kate Forbes to be followed by Anna Sarwar? Of course, it is right to celebrate milestones in the past on International Women's Day, but I am going to use my speech to talk about the continuing violence against women across the world. I am hosting an event this evening on gender justice. In the first two months of 2018 alone, I have heard story after story of sexual harassment, of domestic abuse, of trafficking and of prostitution. All of those are just symptoms of the same problem, which is objectifying and demeaning women to facilitate violence, abuse and harassment. The stories are deeply unsettling, as are the statistics. Globally, almost 40 per cent of all murders of women are committed by male partners. In Scotland, just over half of the female victims of homicides were killed by their partner or ex-partner. Telling those stories on a day like today is so important, because until there is widespread acceptance of the problem, nothing will change and there will never be an anniversary commemorating that change. We do not want to be advocates forever, we want to celebrate change. The same is true of trafficking of girls and women within Scotland and to Scotland. Many, though not all, are trafficked to work as prostitutes without the power to walk away and at the mercy of people who will use and abuse them as commercial property. Those are unsettling matters, but they are painstakingly true and they are not just restricted to the big cities. A few days ago, it was reported that figures of suspected human trafficking in Scotland had shown a marked increase in 2017. Trafficking does not just affect people from other countries and can take place in every community. That includes each of our communities, no matter how rural they are or off the beaten track. One of the busiest slave trafficking routes anywhere in the world is the trafficking of girls from Nepal to India for forced prostitution. An estimated 100,000 to 200,000 trafficked Nepali people are in India. Each of them have a face, a name and a home. Every year, about 10,000 Nepali women and girls are trafficked to India and attempts to traffic many more are made as well. However, only 350 cases of trafficking were registered with the police. I will say those figures again. Every year, about 10,000 Nepali women are trafficked and only 350 cases are reported. A few weeks ago, I visited Nepal to see some of the anti-trafficking work through the Children at Risk Network, which raises awareness among communities, empowers women and girls with skills and opportunities and tries to improve the economic status of households that would otherwise be vulnerable to offers of trafficking. I met high school girls in a rural village, all of whom were attending computing and tailoring classes so that they could earn a living and contribute to the household income. They were bright girls, as earnest and as giggly as teenage girls in Scotland, but they and their peers faced the very grave risks of trafficking and have no choice over the matter. After the earthquake in 2015, the numbers of trafficked women rose significantly because of the increase in poverty. Selling a woman is, today, in communities in Nepal, a means of feeding a family. They are sold by brothers, by fathers and by husbands. Summer saved. Deepika is a 17-year-old girl who was taken by her brother to the passport office to apply for a passport. The authorities had a few doubts about her reasons for applying because, when she was asked where she was going and why, she did not know. After a number of other questions, the authorities discovered that the man was not actually her brother. He was there just to send her abroad. He swiftly disappeared and Deepika was supported to go home after being counselled on the risks of trafficking and sexual exploitation. She was under the impression that she was to be given a job in India that would contribute to household income. Not everybody is saved before it's too late. Last week, International Justice Mission, which was the subject of a member's debate by Gillian Martin last year, helped police to bust a trafficking network in India, based in a hotel where girls and young women were being sold for sex through a secretive trafficking network, who were making thousands from their abuse. Of the six victims, two were children. Almost 20 per cent of victims in private trafficking networks are children and young girls. Last year, in the same city, four women were rescued. The youngest was 13 years old. They had been moved around constantly, being sold for sex in homes and apartments. There are thousands more today, as we called this debate, who are still in grotty hellholes bought and sold by anybody with the cash, and obviously, particularly vulnerable because they are women and they are at the mercy of the men in their lives who will buy and sell them in order to feed other family members. Those women need our voices, to shame the inaction by the authorities, to support the efforts of charities such as IJM and Tier Fund and to pray and hope for the day when women across the world are free of that kind of abuse. As a woman, it is my right that I should not be subjected to violence, to domestic abuse, to rape, to sexual assault, to commercial sexual exploitation or to honour-based violence. Until all women can claim that right, not just in Scotland, but in every community of every country, there is a lot of work to do. I am proud to stand in solidarity with all the sisters today on International Women's Day and say from the outset that I am proud to call myself a feminist. Directly to men, it makes you no less a man to be a feminist. It makes you no less a man to recognise that gender inequality exists. It makes you no less a man to recognise and celebrate International Women's Day and it makes you no less a man to accept that everyday sexism is real, exists and impacts on women in workplaces, campuses, playgrounds and elsewhere, not just here but right around the world. We owe a duty to all sisters and all women right across the world to accept that, recognise and campaign side by side with them on this important agenda, because we cannot leave any community to fight their battles on their own. For all of us that believe in equality in all its forms, this is a shared fight for each and every single one of us. We cannot leave women to be the voices fighting for gender equality, just like we cannot leave LGBT communities being the ones to fight for LGBT rights, just like we cannot be the ones for asking ethnic minority communities to fight for against racism. We cannot leave Jewish communities to fight anti-semitism alone. We cannot leave Muslim communities to fight Islamophobia alone. Instead, all of us together, shoulder to shoulder, must take on the shared challenges so that we can defeat prejudice, hate and inequality in all its forms and root it out of our society. Others have mentioned the historical context of today. I am proud that today in Glasgow, for example, we unveiled the Mary Barber statue, Mary Barber, the first woman to be elected in the city, a woman who did so much to help so many, not just women but people right across her community fighting against the rent caps, through the rent and fighting for rent controls. I am often asked by people—I am sure that every politician is often asked by people—who inspired you to come into politics? Who are your role models? People are often surprised when I say that my role model is actually my mother. I think that people naturally expect me to say, my father—they expect me to say, I get my politics from my father. In fact, I get my politics from my mother, I get my values from my mother. The reason why is because she is an individual who has never stood for political office, never sought political office but is faced up to racism and fascism throughout her life, since arriving here as a four-year-old but then also as the wife of someone who was trying to be elected as Britain's first Muslim MP. She has done it with a solidity and a bravery that has been inspiring not just to me but to countless other peoples as well. However, she has not stopped there. My mum now lives in Pakistan with my father. She is not there just being the wife of another politician somewhere else. She leads on an international project for women's empowerment on social enterprise. She runs 42 social enterprise units, helping to create employment for young women, particularly from the most deprived communities. She helps to operate two hospitals that give free treatment to the poorest and most vulnerable women. One of the hospitals specialising in maternity care can reduce the number of still births and give support to women. She also supports the school, so she helps to run a school to guarantee education for local girls. She is an inspiration to me. I know that she is not watching today because she is in Pakistan, but I want to send her a message of love and solidarity on International Women's Day. I will make sure that I remember to send her a Mother's Day message on Sunday, too. I have touched upon the global challenges. The reality is that, for far too many women, we fail to recognise that they have no access to democracy still in so many parts of the world. For too many girls, they still do not have access to basic education. The right to go to school is still not a fight that we have won in the world. For some in this world, they still believe that education is something for boys and not for girls. That is something that we have still got to fight in our world today. That right to access basic healthcare. We have rightly talked about ending previous poverty here in Scotland, but for so many women right around the world, even access to basic healthcare is not something that they have. Employment barriers are still right around the world. To think that some countries only allowed women to start driving in the last year alone access to employment and the employment market. The redistribution of wealth, how wealth is owned by people not just in this country but around the world, about the percentage of women that own property, land and business that help to grow their economies. I recall when I was a shadow international development minister in a different Parliament that one of the most successful projects that I saw was microfinance projects that were happening in some of the most developed countries in the poorest countries in the world that were being led by women. When I spoke to those women and those families, I asked, why do you think that microfinance is coming into the hands of women rather than to the men in your society? The answer was two answers back. One, because it is a recognition that we have a voice and a role to play to. Secondly, if you invest in a woman, we will make sure that the community benefits. We cannot guarantee that that will happen if you invest in the men in the community. That is very true. We are not meaning that as a joke. I did not take it as a joke. It is true that women have that responsibility not just to themselves but to their wider society. I reflect on something that my grandfather used to always say. He was never very keen on sending my, particularly where his sons went to university or what they studied. In fact, one of his sons dropped out of university. He made not a bad career about himself but dropped out of university. However, he put most focus on his daughter going to university, studying to be a doctor and serving in our national health service here in Scotland as a general practitioner. I remember asking him once about why he was so focused on his daughter's education and did not care about his son's education. The reason is that if you educate a man, you benefit one person. If you educate a woman, you benefit a family. That is a fundamental principle that needs to be shared around the world. I realise that I have taken up more of my time. The everyday sexism campaign that has gripped rightly media in the past six months or more and issues of sexual harassment have, I hope, woken up people to the realities that women face every single day. I would challenge any man in this country or in the world if they had not reflected on that campaign and thought about their behaviour in everyday situations and what that might have meant and the impact that that might have had on women around them. I know that I have reflected on my behaviour and I would hope that every man reflects on their behaviour so that we can give fairness, equality and justice to everyone. We have made progress but, my God, we have a lot more progress to do. I stand shoulder to shoulder with sisters in that project. I was hesitant to interrupt you there when you were doing so well. We have a little, just a little few minutes in hand so I can give you a generous six minutes, Ms Lennon, when you sum up for Labour. I welcome the chance to close the debate today on behalf of Scottish Labour and to speak in favour of the amendment to the motion by my colleague Rhoda Grant. There is indeed much that we can celebrate about on-going work to address women's inequality in Scotland but, as well as an opportunity for celebration, International Women's Day for me is also an opportunity for women to organise and to highlight the work that still needs to be done. The Government's motion today acknowledges its on-going commitment and activity to tackle women's inequality. I commend Angela Constance for the leadership that she shows as cabinet secretary with responsibility for equalities. I try to think of a word. I think that it may be magical. Sandra White's eyesight improved in the middle of her speech, so I think that something special has happened here today. I think that there has been an emotional connection across the chamber because, although we sit in different parties and have different views on some issues, a lot of the issues that we have discussed today really resonate and either affect us directly or people that we care about. I am really grateful to everyone's contribution so far. We have reflected in the debate on the achievements that we have made here in Scotland over the past few years, the passing of historic legislation in the form of the domestic abuse bill, the gender representation on public boards bill and the criminalisation of revenge porn. Those are significant legislative leaps forward but strengthen women's rights in Scotland. I commend activists and parliamentarians alike who have been responsible for achieving those significant wins for women's equality. Those victories are evidence of what can be achieved when women and, more importantly, feminists and feminist women are elected into positions of power. It is evidence of why I, like many others across the chamber, remain restless and impatient for further and faster progress on women's political representation. We know that the key to achieving change in so many of those issues lies in ensuring that decision-making bodies are reflective of the society that they seek to represent. I am grateful to Alison Johnstone and others who are part of the Women's 50 collective, and that really has made a difference. When reflecting on today's debate, the progress that we have made so far and the progress that we have yet to achieve, it struck me that there are only so many times that we can repeat the same arguments, the same statistics and the same debates over and over again. The statistics around women's representation have been rehashed so many times in this chamber and by myself alone on more than one occasion—I have not been here this long—that women, especially women of colour, are underrepresented in our national parliament. In fact, there has never been a woman of colour in this Parliament. Our media, our public boards and in our councils is an unacceptable truth. Why does it matter? It matters because we are still living in a society where violence against women is all too common. We are one in three women who work even in this place. In this building, we can say that they have experienced sexist behaviour, sexual harassment, and we have read that in the recent survey that was published just last week. Most of us are not surprised at all by those findings. It matters because we still live in a society where only a fraction of reported rapes are even prosecuted and even a smaller fraction of those results are in a conviction. Claudia Beamish, who I think had to leave the chamber, is right when the media reports on those crimes. It is not about sex, it is about violence against women, and it is about the abuse of power. There has been some great speech—I cannot mention them all, I think. I have already tweeted that Gail Ross was outstanding, but Gillian Martin made me cry because those issues are very, very real. I do not want any woman to come into this workplace and feel unsafe. I do not want that for any woman in any part of Scotland or indeed beyond. The spirit of Labour's amendment today is to highlight the theme of this year's international women's day press for progress. To me, it feels like this year that we are starting to see on the back of the momentum from the MeToo and the times up movement that maybe people are going to wake up and we are going to see some real change. Just last night, a well-known woman in politics, Mary Black, was telling it as it is in Goods on Mary Black, reading out violent, offensive, frightening abuse that is sent to her in a public forum. So why shouldn't she say it in a public place, particularly in our Parliament? Why should women in politics keep quiet about this? On Twitter, I discovered it. I was described as the human equivalent of an anthrax soaked razor wire tampon. How dare we, as women, fight to combat period poverty? I have been undeterred and I have worked with women across this chamber, including Gillian Martin, Victoria Heaney from Women for the Indie. We are not going to shut up and be silent on this issue. I am pleased today to mark international women's day that I have lodged a final proposal on my members' bill to establish legal rights, which would give everyone who menstruates in Scotland the right to access free sanitary products. If we can get this right in Scotland—we have heard a lot today about women's, the injustice against women globally—we can get this right and help affect change across the world. I know that my time is almost up, Presiding Officer. Yes, there is a lot that we can celebrate on international women's day, but there is still so much more that we have to do. It feels like in the chamber today the spirit of Mary Barber and her army is with us. Rosa Grant says that we want to be respected. Gail Ross says that lip service won't do. Rona Mackay says that we will not give up. Anna Sarwar and Alex Cole-Hamill has just some of the men who have made their commitment to our cause, too. That just leaves me to say happy international women's day to all of you. Thank you very much, Ms Lennon. I call on Alison Hanneson to close with the Conservatives a generous eight minutes, please. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I am delighted this afternoon to continue the consensus that has been the hallmark of this debate. As we celebrate over 100 years of international women's day, I feel a deep sense of pride to look around this chamber and take in the success of so many women, as was also noted by Clare Haughey. While today is a day for celebrating our achievements, it is our obligation to ensure that we do not become complacent and instead push ahead to make even greater strides in the next 100 years to guarantee the true equality and empowerment of women. We have heard excellent contributions from across the chamber, from the opening speech made by Angela Constance, who spoke about equality for women and girls and what actually matters to our children today. I feel that here is a cause that surely few people could disagree with. A Parliament united in support to protect and uphold the rights of women and girls in this Scotland year of young people, and acknowledging the role played by organisations such as Girlguiding Scotland, YoungScot and the YWCA Scotland to name but a few organisations. Those voluntary groups play their part in helping girls realise their potential and build their confidence to prove that not only are they every bit as good as men, but help them strive to surpass them and become leaders in their fields, whether it is business, science, arts, professions or politics. In 2018, it is unbelievable that there is an on-going need for women to push every day for causes such as closing the gender pay gap, encouraging more women into public life and standing up for women who suffer from harassment and abuse to continue to call out every day sexism. Very recently, as we will have seen at the Golden Globes a few months ago, all eyes were on the red carpet as actors wore all black in a show of solidarity with victims of sexual harassment. Rhoda Grant this afternoon spoke passionately about the devastating effects of domestic abuse. There are obviously still barriers to overcome and, yes, glass ceilings still need to be broken. However, from the red carpet down to each and every female in 2018, we all want to see progress being made and it is becoming more apparent that women are definitely uniting and becoming active for women's equality, which is being aided by social media campaigns such as Me Too and Times Up. I would like to honour the press for progress campaign that was mentioned earlier by Christina McKelvie and others. That is uniting women all over the world in the pursuit of gender equality. This movement aims to challenge stereotypes, celebrate women's achievements and lobby for greater gender parity, which if no immediate action and concerted effort is made to include women at all levels of the economy, gender pay parity will not be achieved for another 200 years, as we have already heard from Alison Johnson and others today. Quite incredible. A recent report from the World Economic Forum found a direct link between gender parity and the success of an economy. That illustrates that closing the gender pay gap is not only good for women but good for society as a whole. This message is one that we need to promote in this chamber and in our communities because women's rights matter to all of us. On a positive and indeed pertinent note, the WEF data also shows that when women are more present and participating in leadership roles, more women are hired right across the board at all levels. That detail holds true even when taking into consideration the disparities in the size of female talent pools across various industry sectors. Different political parties may have different ideas on how to close the gap in representations that exist, but we all acknowledge that elected office is an area in which women continue to be underrepresented. We can differ on how we get there but not on the need to see more women standing for elected roles, whether for councils or for Scottish and UK parliaments. Last year, my party launched Women to Win, which aims to promote the brightest and best women in the party. I would like to acknowledge the role that Annie Wells and others have played in pushing forward the agenda for Women to Win Scotland. We heard earlier from Maurice Corry about the launch of the new commission within my party. As part of the Scottish Government's programme of themed years, 2018 is the year of young people. It is good that young people are being celebrated, and this year of young people gives young girls the opportunity to celebrate their achievements and their contribution to communities, while also giving them the opportunity to shine locally, nationally and globally, as recognised in this motion today. We have heard from my colleague Margaret Mitchell, who has spoken about women's attainment in the legal profession and others who have spoken about STEM subjects. I agree that much progress has been made, but I also agree that there is still much work needed to be done. It is true that, over the past few years, the number of passes by girls in STEM subjects at school has increased not only in higher qualifications in maths and computing but also in higher qualifications in chemistry and physics. Nevertheless, I believe that, in the chamber this afternoon, we all recognise that gender stereotyping is still discouraging girls from taking STEM subjects at school and aspiring to STEM careers. I strongly believe that, in our recognition of that fact, this is the first step towards correcting this and in going forward seeing the numbers steadily increase for girls not only at school but going forward into college and university. Many good points have been made from across the chamber this afternoon, and I recognise all the speakers in this debate who have made very valid and useful contributions. To hear Anna Sarwar talk about her mum and how inspirational she was, I found that very touching as a mother, and I would like to hope that my son perhaps will speak of me in even slightly glowing terms going forward. I am excited to work with everyone in this chamber to advance real gender quality, respect for women and the upliftment of women in politics. I appreciate the opportunity that International Women's Day has provided for discussing the important issues on this public platform, and I welcome all input into solving them. Working together, we can realise the potential of women in Scotland and improve lives of all. I just think that Mr Sarwar has caused a lot of problems for my sons as well. I ask Mili Todd to close with the Government Minister until 5 o'clock, please. Thank you, Presiding Officer, and I am delighted to have gained a little bit of extra time from my closing remarks because, as you can imagine, I have plenty to say on this topic. Given the focus this year on young women and girls, I am absolutely delighted to be closing today's international women's debate. It is a pleasure and a privilege to be able to do this job and to have the opportunity almost every day to say to young women, if I can do it, you can do it. You can, dream big, aim high and go for it. I thank all the members who have contributed to this afternoon's debate. It is clear that across the chamber we are united in achieving gender parity and we want to see action taken both here and abroad to ensure that women are treated equally and fairly in the workplace, in the home and in society. It is clear that we all want for our future generations what we all want for our future generations. As we have heard, 2018 is Scotland's year of young people. I would like to highlight the uniqueness of this year in being the first to recognise people as one of Scotland's greatest assets. Scotland is the first country in the world that we know of to dedicate a full year to celebrating young people. That is a unique opportunity to show our young people how valued they are and how proud Scotland is of all that it does and all that it can achieve in the future. This is a new, innovative approach and it is only right to welcome the entire ethos of the year, which is that it is being developed by young people for young people. Activities throughout the year will focus on celebrating the achievements, recognising the contribution of our young people and what they do to contribute to communities all across Scotland. In return, we need to ensure that we are creating opportunities for their voices to be heard and, most importantly, for their voices to be listened to. Children and young people should be at the heart of decisions that affect them. That is their right as set out in article 12 of the UNCRC. Now, in the Children and Young People Scotland Act 2014, it is also central to the ethos of the year of young people. To ensure that there is continuity throughout the year, a group of young people communicating have also been recruited. Supported by young Scott, their role is to champion the values of co-design and to ensure that young people's voices are heard and acted upon across activities for the year. We want to ensure that all of our young people feel and believe that they are valued, wanted and vital to our country's future. The Government is committed to giving young people a stronger voice in policymaking and co-designing improvements to services that affect their lives. In doing so, by changing perceptions of young people and changing the country's relationship with our young people, it is our aspiration to create a lasting legacy beyond 2018. I will respond to some of the points that were raised during the debate. Annie Wells, I would say to you on the gender pay gaps that there is definitely no room for complacency. However, the pay gap is narrower here in Scotland than in the rest of the UK. We are taking decisive action where we have the powers. We also have a slightly higher female employment rate in Scotland than the rest of the UK. I hardly need to mention the transformative potential of our expansion in early learning and childcare, which will undoubtedly enable many more mothers to work. Because of our commitment to the living wage, the largely female workforce will all get a well-deserved pay rise. To Rhoda Grant, my colleague Angela Constance has already intervened to highlight the issues around universal credit, a topic that I have spoken very passionately about, as you and I represent an area in which it has already been trialled and been in practice for many years. I would welcome all parties' support in tackling that devastating policy at source at Westminster. On domestic abuse, the Scottish Government has committed already to providing additional funding specifically to train 14,000 officers and staff. That dedicated funding will enable Police Scotland to train officers and staff to identify the new offence. Scottish Women's Age will also receive some funding to develop training to help communities to understand the legislation. To Alex Cole-Hamilton, in a slightly teasing fashion, I am not sure if I understood you correctly, but I do not want you to mansplain me. I am not sure, but did I hear Alex Cole-Hamilton offer to stand down at the next election to ensure that a woman can have his seat, or perhaps his words were intended for some of his colleagues, not for himself? To Michelle Ballantyne, I will put back Christina McKelvie's words right back at you, as they say on social media. Men of quality should not fear equality. I would love to see the day when there is no such thing as boys' jobs and girls' jobs. I am keen at the moment to attract young men and older men into careers in early years. We do not want to undervalue the work that women traditionally do, and we do not want to corral anyone into any job. Of course, people should be able to freely choose their path in life. Can you hear it with the murmurings around the chamber and the people who are trying to intervene? I think that you under-acknowledged the barriers that we face, not least the lack of role models and not least the culture and conditioning, which led, I would say, to someone like me, who was an absolute science geek as a youngster, who has hires in physics, maths, biology and chemistry to not once consider engineering as a career and to train as a health professional—a career that I absolutely love, I have to say. Michelle Ballantyne The point that I made very strongly was that it is the barriers that we need to address. It is not about gender, it is about the barriers. The barriers, in your case, I do not know what they were, whether it was your teachers, your parents or whatever, but it was those barriers because you had the capability to do it, and that is what is important, and it is the barriers that we need to address. Maree Todd So, again, I just reflect—I ask you to reflect on the murmurings that that is causing around the chamber. There is clearly something in what you are saying, which is out of step with many other women in this chamber. I thoroughly enjoyed everybody—many women in the chamber raised and men—to talk about some of the very strong and powerful women that we have seen in Scotland in our history, including Mary Barber, whose statue was unveiled today. I would give a wee plea—I think that both Gillian Martin and Rona talked about these historical women being written out of history. I would give a wee plea for the rioting women from all over the Highlands, who were absolutely integral in resisting landowners' moves to clear them off the land. I understand when I was growing up that it was the women of Coyach just north of where I grew up, who not only stripped the sheriff officer who came to clear them off the land of the summonses that he had brought with him, but they also stripped him of his clothes and sent him packing in the boat that he arrived in. I look forward to seeing that commemorated on her story project. I want to move on to talk about sexual harassment—an issue that a number of people raised in the chamber. Sexual harassment or abuse of any form, whether in the workplace, in the home or in society, is completely reprehensible and must stop. Everyone has the right to live their life free of abuse, harassment and intimidation, and I encourage anyone who has experienced this to report it. We have to tackle the underlying attitudes and inequalities and the culture that perpetuates this behaviour. All workplaces, whether in a political party or in any Parliament, must have robust processes for reporting and dealing with harassment or bullying. Those should be fair, sensitive and supportive to all the parties involved. Harassment is not a problem specific to any one institution. It is the responsibility of all of us in society and for all of us as individuals to take action. This could be a watershed moment in which we could see real societal change in the treatment of women, but we need to seize that opportunity for change. We heard an incredibly powerful contribution from Gillian Martin, who talked about the insidious, sustained, thinly veiled sexual comments that women suffer. I also salute those women who were brave enough in the last year to speak up and make a difference for all of us. I commend to the chamber the poem Spartica, which I tweeted today by Pipa Little, and I am going to quote directly from it. I am proud to stand together with all the other humorless bitches, and I quote, who do not tolerate banter either. I will move on to sport, the girl guiding survey that a number of people talked about and which the cabinet secretary referred to highlighted the positive impact of sport with girls, saying that it helped them to be more healthy and feel more confident and positive. The Scottish Government is encouraging more women and girls to take up sport through our £300,000 sporting equality fund. We have established a women and girls sport advisory group to shape future action. It was great to hear Alison Johnstone talking about some of her sporting heroines. I am delighted that that advisory group has one of my sporting heroines, Dee Bradbury, who came from Alison Johnstone's sport of athletics into my sport of rugby and is still forging a pioneering path by becoming the first ever female president of the SRU, first tier one nation female president later this year. On early learning and childcare, our plan to an early double-funded early learning and childcare entitlement for all three and four-year-olds and some two-year-olds will make a vital contribution to our priorities to grow our economy, tackle inequality and close the containment gap. Before I move to my concluding remarks, I thank all the organisations that do a fantastic job supporting children and young people in Scotland in one way or another. Y WCA Scotland, Girlguiding Scotland, Young Scotland, Children in Scotland, the Scottish Youth Parliament and the Children's Parliament, to name a few. Thank you also to our delivery partners for the year of young people. In addition to those already mentioned, COSLA, Sport Scotland, Creative Scotland and Visit Scotland, and a special mention and thanks to Communicating, a group of young people who are co-designing the year of young people activity. One of my favourite writers is the Nigerian author of Half of a Yellow Sun and Americana Cimomanda Angosi Adici. She said, gender as it functions today is a grave injustice. I am angry. We should all be angry. Anger has a long history of bringing about positive change, but I am also hopeful because I believe deeply in the ability of human beings to remake themselves for the better. This afternoon, we have acknowledged that, 100 years after some women got the right to vote, though there has been considerable progress in women's rights, gender equality still eludes us. We have also reaffirmed our commitment to remaking our society for the better to creating a more equal and fairer Scotland—one where young women and girls do not anticipate sexual harassment or being paid less than their male counterparts as inevitable. I do believe that we will get there. There is an energy at the moment. I have met and spoken to too many of Scotland's young women and girls to think otherwise. Their message is very clear. Enough is enough. The time is now. I am going to finish with another quote by a very proud feminist, Barack Obama. Change will not come if we wait for some other person or if we wait for some other time. We are the ones that we have been waiting for. We are the change that we seek. Thank you very much, and that concludes our debate on International Women's Day. The next item of business is consideration of five parliamentary bureau motions. I can ask Joe Fitzpatrick, on behalf of the bureau, to move motions 10839 to 10842 on approval of SSIs and motion 10901 on committee meetings. The first question is amendment 10851.1, in the name of Annie Wells, who seeks to amend motion 10851 in the name of Angela Constance on International Women's Day, be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are agreed. The next question is amendment 10851.2, in the name of Rhoda Grant, who seeks to amend motion 10851, in the name of Angela Constance, be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are agreed. And the next question is that motion 10851, in the name of Angela Constance, as amended on International Women's Day, be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are agreed. And I will put a single question on the five parliamentary bureau motions. Does anyone object? Good. The question is that motions 10839 to 10842 and 10901, in the name of Joe Fitzpatrick, be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are agreed. And that concludes decision time. I close this meeting.