The Conservatives have a “fundamental problem” when it comes to recruiting young women to the party, the shadow minister for women and equalities has said.
Mims Davies said the number of women wanting to work for and with the party is “diminishing”, and called for pride in being a Conservative woman to be boosted.
At the Conservative Party conference in Birmingham, Ms Davies also argued that it’s “much harder to come out as a Tory than anything else”, whilst suggesting that Tory members could meet the love of their life at the annual event.
Speaking at a Women 2 Win fringe event, Ms Davies said: “I think we’ve got an existential crisis when it comes to the women vote, I don’t think women know what we stand for and how we support women, and therefore the candidates pool and the people who want to work with us is diminishing.
“Whoever gets into number 10 is decided by the women’s vote, that is the reality.
“So if we do not capture that turnout, we cannot win, and that’s why we often find ourselves languishing in terms of those majorities.”
She went on to say: “I look around this conference, there is no problem attracting young men to this party, there is a fundamental problem with attracting young women to this party.”
Ms Davies described the Conservative Party as “Narnia” as she argued it was a place where women could meet their future partners.
She said: “I want people to say in 20/30 years’ time, I met the love of my life, or this was my journey with this party, and I don’t think this is happening for women, and we need to be absolutely fighting for that experience – either to find the love of your life or stay having this party as the love of your life.
“I call it Narnia, once you push back all the coats, and go to the back of the wardrobe you get into this really weird world where everybody knows each other, some very weird customs, but you actually feel very comfortable and have a wonderful time.
“But how do you get people to get to the back of the wardrobe, how do you invite people in?”
The former minister added: “Women vote for women, and women vote on issues. Why have the Lib Dems done well? Because ultimately the NHS, sewage, care, things like that is what they’ve connected with, and therefore have pulled that vote to them.
“Women will vote for what matters, not just to themselves, they may not be worried about these particular issues, but they’ll be worried about the people around them being worried or impacted by those issues.
“So I think we have to be a bit more issues-led, and it’s not solely about women’s health, or women’s issues, women worry about their jobs, their mortgage, their security.”
Elsewhere, Ms Davies spoke about her experience of “coming out” as a Tory. She said: “We just need to help women to identify with being a Conservative.”
“It’s much harder to come out as a Tory than anything else, particularly for women, we’ve got to sort this out and be proud of being Conservative women,” she added.
Referring to Baroness May’s decision to create a 50/50 whips office during her leadership, Ms Davies said: “I think there are sometimes some symptomatic things that we do as a party or as a group where we reward a bunch of men and maybe one or two women.
“And I think what Theresa did was say: ‘we reward equally’.”
On Tory leadership candidate Kemi Badenoch’s comments on maternity pay, Ms Davies said: “If the bits that jump out to women look like we’re not connecting with them, that can be a concern. I think Kemi’s tried to reset that.
“But of course we’re in the middle of a leadership campaign, things are going to look slightly out of context.”
She added: “I wouldn’t want that to be a distraction, I think we knew where she was coming from, but I think actually connecting women is really, really key.
“So I hope that doesn’t detract because I genuinely think – she was my boss at the Government Equalities Office and a mum herself who has been through having little ones – so I genuinely don’t think that’s what it was.”
Elsewhere during the Women 2 Win fringe event, chairman of the party’s candidates committee Matt Wright said: “We have to, as a party, create an institutional narrative that attracts women into our party.”
Conservative peer Lord Booth said: “We don’t want to diminish the number of men, we want to increase the number of women in the party.”
The chairman of the Conservative National Convention said the party has not done enough when it comes to outreach, adding: “Unfortunately because of the state of the party finances, it’s going to be very difficult.”
