ON THE DISTAFF SIDE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 214, 11 September 1939, Page 6

ON THE DISTAFF SIDE.

IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS

It is twenty years since women were admitted as members of the Houise of Commons, and the end of the second decade finds a round dozen of them there. This small "but vocal coterie of legislators in a total membership of lilo igot its start on November 28, 191!), through the election of Ameriean J born Viscountess Astor. She took the oath and her seat on December 1 of that year. Possibly weary of never seeing women anywhere in the Commons except spectators in the galleries, tiie M.P.'s had voted a year previously to legalise women's admission to the floor below.

After two decades Lady Astor still is in the Commons, the doyenne of the women M.P.'s who are holding their own in the House and generally voted a success in having brought their special experience of home and family problems to bear on the deliberations of a Parliament which is increasingly concerned with such subjects. 17,000,000 Women Voters. In that time, too, the number of -women voters has risen from zero to 17,000,000, more than half the total British. electorate, and only a few months ago a woman, Mrs. Evaline Lowe, became, in effect, Mayor of London through her election a<s L.C.C. chairman.

Some wonder why British women, preponderant in the electorate, have not wielded their voting power to send more women to the hall* of Westminster. They take some comfort, however, in taking Mock of the situation across the Atlantic, where only five women are members of the United States Congressone Senator and four representatives. In England the answer is that however numerous the women voters, it .-till is a "man's country."

The women who have been elected to Parliament, however, can point to major legislative achievements. Red-headed Ellen Wilkinson, a Labourite, for instance, tackled the instalment-buying problem, and produced a hill which 'became law last winter a* the Hire Purchase Act. It protects the little man from sharp practice when he buys his radio, refrigerator or automobile on so-called "easy terms." She is now piloting the building societies bill, to protect house purchasers. Eleanor Rathbone. a thoroughly independent M.P. with a Victorian precision of manner, sponsored the Family Inheritance Act, which protects widows, widowers and children from being cut out of wills. Nemesis of "Red Biddy.", Florence Horsbru<rh, a melodious-voiced Conservative, pushed through a bill which stopped the. sale in Scotland of "red biddy," a poisonous mixture of cheap red wine and methylated alcolfol. She is also the author of the child adoption measure, a notable protective bill which is soon to be placed on the Statute Book.

Another Conservative, Irene Ward, has just introduced a bill to stop the sale of British ships abroad. It probably will become law. She also persuaded the Government to provide pocket money for pensioners in old age homes.

Then there is Dr. Edith Summerskill, second newest woman member. She hasn't sponsored any bills yet, but she is a fearless, competent member, and the other day she forced the grumbling male membership to provide a mirror in the Commons cloakroom. Yet the Commons barber shop is still "for men only," and no woman M.P. has been able to get her hair set there.

Six of the twelve women M.P.'s are married. Six are staunchly Tory; four are Socialists; one is a Liberal, and there is one Independent —sixty-year-old Eleanor Rathbone. a confirmed spinster who represents the Combined English Universities. Three of the group—Lady Astor among them-—succeeded their husbands in the Commons. Only one of the twelve, Miss Rathbone. has been elected without contest; that was in 1035.

All have one tiling jn common-—an ability to talk and to hold tliejr own in Parliamentary frav. Xone of the twelve is more distinguished in this respect than Lady As tor. Born Nancy Witcher Langliorne, daughter of Cljiswell Dahnev Langhorne, of Greenwood, Va., she is a Tory, a Christian Scientist, teetotaller, mother of five children, and a golfing grandmother.