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Directors: Females

Question for Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy

UIN HL3039, tabled on 7 November 2016

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what measures they are taking to increase levels of gender equality in the boardrooms of UK-based public limited companies.

Answered on

16 November 2016

The Government believes it is in the best interests of business to tap into the widest talent pool and to have a diverse leadership which draws on a variety of backgrounds, skills and experiences.

That is why, following the recommendations in the final report of Lord Davies’s Review on Women on Boards, published in October 2015, we appointed Sir Philip Hampton and Dame Helen Alexander to lead a new review into improving the gender balance in FTSE leadership. The first report of the Hampton-Alexander Review was published on 9 November 2016, and sets a FTSE 350 target of at least 33% representation of women on their Boards by 2020 and a 33% target for women in senior leadership positions for the FTSE 100 also by 2020.

As of October 2016, women now make up 23% of FTSE 350 boards positions, up from 21.9% in October 2015. This was 9.5% at the start of the Davies Review in 2011.

Answered by

Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy