Theresa May or Andrea Leadsom will be the next British prime minister. This afternoon, Conservative MPs knocked out Secretary of State for Justice Michael Gove in the second round of voting for the next candidate to lead their party and the country.
This means that on September 9, the U.K. will have its second-ever female PM, after Margaret Thatcher resigned in 1990, which in itself is a tiny progressive step towards gender equality in politics.
But as a BBC journalist
helpfully reminded viewers recently, "May and Leadsom may both be women, but they have quite different views."
May is the current favorite by quite a long way and public support for her, particularly among women on social media, seems to have strengthened since Conservative Ken Clarke called her a “bloody difficult woman” on
Sky News. By contrast, Leadsom’s CV has been ripped to shreds
by the mainstream press.
British voters won't have a say over who becomes the next PM unless unless they're a Conservative party member, but
Refinery29.co.uk has taken a look at where the possible future leaders stand on some of the issues most likely to affect women in the U.K.
Crime Against Women
Theresa May, as home secretary for six years, made moves to tackle violent crime against women and girls. She was vocal about
police failure to investigate rape and made
tackling modern-day slavery one of her main priorities. She also set up inquiries into
child sex abuse and
undercover policing after a controversy involving
undercover officers betraying women.
However, she failed to secure national funding for women’s shelters,
The Guardian reported, and supports immigration detention centers.
Unlike May, Leadsom has never held a Cabinet position, so it’s unclear where she stands on violence against women. In the past, she voted against
laws promoting equality and human rights and for
restricting the scope of legal aid.
Education
Both candidates voted for raising undergraduate tuition fees in England to 9,000 pounds per year in 2010. However, May
voted against fees in the past while Leadsom has
always supported them. Leadsom also voted to end the education maintenance allowance (EMA), which provided financial support to 16-19 year olds in training and further education. May didn’t vote.
Brexit
May backed the campaign to remain in the E.U., but she is Euroskeptic. After the result, she announced that “Brexit means Brexit.” As such, she would work towards Britain leaving the E.U. as PM and she is experienced when it comes to negotiating in Europe,
The Guardian reported.
Leadsom was a vocal "Leave" supporter in the run-up to the referendum and believes the U.K. would thrive outside the E.U., a view that makes her an attractive candidate for UKIP. supporters. However, somewhat awkwardly, in the past, she said losing the U.K.'s AAA credit rating would be “
seriously bad news” — something that is now a
post-referendum reality.
Jobs
Leadsom
once said small businesses shouldn’t have to offer basic rights to their workers, including minimum wage, maternity or paternity rights, unfair dismissal rights, or pension rights. She has voted against funding to secure jobs for long-time
unemployed young people.
By contrast, as the Conservative equality spokesperson in 2008, May made comments
supporting equal maternity and paternity leave. However, she also voted against spending on jobs for long-time
unemployed young people.
Relationships
Gay supporters of May have compared her to a parent who has “come to terms with” her gay child,
BBC Newsbeat reported. In the past, she voted against reducing the age of consent for gay people, the
repeal of Section 28 (the prohibition of promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material), and civil partnerships. But she voted for equal marriage in 2013 and has a group of gay followers on
Twitter.
It’s fair to say Leadsom wouldn’t be a very socially progressive PM. She is staunchly pro-marriage, having written on her
personal blog that “marriage IS KEY to the safety of our society” and blaming social problems on
single parenthood. But she is less keen on marriage between same-sex couples — she abstained from voting on gay marriage in 2013 and said today that she “
didn’t like” the equal-marriage legislation. She has also implied that
straight couples should be ahead of gay couples in the adoption queue.
