Friday was International Women’s Day, this years theme was #Balanceforbetter shining a light on the importance of gender balance. My workplace, the House of Commons, is an example of this very problem. 

When I was first elected I was the 209th woman to enter Parliament. With 650 MPs elected in each session the UK has still not elected enough women to fill just one parliament. This is a shocking statistic that shows just how much work we all need to do to address the terrible gender imbalance in politics.

Thankfully, here in Garston and Halewood Labour has made great strides in dealing with this very issue. 12 out of 17 of our local Labour Councillors are women and the constituency has been represented by a woman in parliament since 1997. There are intelligent, talented women all over Liverpool and our country who are standing up to be a voice for their local communities.

It is more important than ever that we encourage women to play an active role in politics and public life. Hopefully one day soon Parliament will be truly representative of our country and have a 50/50 gender balance.