Liberal MP Sharman Stone says party needs mandatory female quotas

Updated

The Liberal Party should introduce mandatory quotas for women to help boost the number of females in Parliament, according to a long-serving Federal Government MP.

Victorian Liberal backbencher Sharman Stone has suggested her colleagues should look to Labor for ideas about how to get more women into politics.

"I'm beginning to think very seriously that really, the Liberal Party, we have to do more," Dr Stone told AM.

The Labor Party has long had a quota system in place, although it is yet to achieve its target of getting women into 40 per cent of its seats.

The Liberal Party is opposed to the Labor model of quotas, arguing candidates should be preselected on merit rather than gender.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott has been criticised for the make-up of his cabinet because it includes only one woman, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop.

Dr Stone, speaking ahead of today's International Women's Day celebrations, said she was very disappointed to see her Liberal colleagues recently dump Mary Wooldridge from the safe Victorian state seat of Kew.

She said the Liberal Party needed to do more to ensure women are preselected in winnable seats.

Sex Discrimination Commissioner Elizabeth Broderick says that with only 30 per cent of MPs being women she would support any measure that boosts that number.

"There's a view that this will naturally solve itself because we've got many women who are highly educated who will naturally come up," she told Sky News.

"I think the evidence shows we need a different, more systemic intervention.

"That could be a target, a quota, it could be a whole range of things, but one thing's for sure, we need a greater proportion of women in Australia's Parliament."

However, Federal Finance Minister Mathias Cormann says he does not believe in having quotas, describing the number of women in Parliament as a "side issue".

"We've got formidable women at all levels of our parliamentary team," he told Sky.

'Quotas not tokenism': Stone

Dr Stone says her views have changed over time because she is seeing fewer women joining her party.

"We've got to be, I think, much more structured about making sure women come through," she said.

She rejects suggestions from some of her partyroom colleagues that quotas will simply see "token" women enter Parliament.

"I don't care about that 'tokenism' label; bring it on if you must," she said.

"We'll prove that it's not about a woman being simply put there because of her gender - she'll prove her worth.

"Put her in the place and stand back and watch her grow."

While she says the level of female cabinet representation is "disappointing", Dr Stone predicts Tony Abbott will look for more women when he eventually reshuffles his ministry.

Dr Stone, who represents the once-safe National Party seat of Murray, became a junior minister in the Howard government and served on the Coalition frontbench when Mr Abbott was opposition leader.

Topics: community-and-society, federal-government, government-and-politics, liberals, political-parties, australia

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