How are women and minorities represented in UK Parliament?
Although there is still far to go before the make-up of the House of Commons reflects the population of the UK, the 2019 general election did create the UK鈥檚 most diverse Parliament with more female MPs elected as well as more MPs from ethnic minority backgrounds. Alongside this the number of MPs who identify as LGBT+ has also risen.
Out of 650 MPs in the House of Commons: 鈥
- 226 are female 鈥 35% of the Commons
- 65 are from ethnic minorities 鈥10% of the Commons
- 45 openly identify as LGBT+ 鈥 6.9% of the Commons
- 5 have declared disabilities - 0.75% of the Commons
- 173 went to private schools 鈥26.6% of the Commons
The definition for 'ethnic minority' is take from the UK Parliament, which uses the term to mean everyone except the 'white' ethnic group in Great Britain, and except the 'white' and 'Irish Traveller' categories in Northern Ireland.
Comparisons with the UK population
Just over 50% of the UK population are female so a rate 33.8 % shows that women are still under-represented in Parliament. Over the course of the last few Parliaments that rate is increasing slowly 鈥 in 2005 the Commons was 20% female; in 2010 it was 22%; and in 2017 it was 32%.
Around 14% of the UK population identify as belonging to an ethnic minority. This contrasts with the 10% rate of MPs in the Commons. However, this is an improvement from 2017 where it was 8%.
While available data is vague, it is estimated somewhere between 1.5 to 5% of the population identify themselves as belonging to the LGBT+ community so the Commons compares favourably. However, Stonewall 鈥 a major LGBTQ+ charity 鈥 notes that the transgender community is still under-represented. In 2017 nine transgender candidates campaigned to become MPs 鈥 none were elected.
According to research by the Disability Policy Centre, as of March 2022 there are eight MPs who have declared themselves to be disabled. This is 1.23 % of the House of Commons while - including mental health 鈥 20 % of people in the UK identify as having some form of disability.
The widest difference between the make-up of the House of Commons and the UK involves education. Only around 7% of the UK population attended a private school but in the Commons this figure climbs to 26.6%. However, this has decreased from 2017.