I was up earlier than usual this morning, because at 10:00 – 11:00 I’ll be in a BBC studio discussing a recent report by the Women’s Business Council, widely reported on the BBC and elsewhere:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-22766643

The gist of the report is that if more women were economically active, the economy would be transformed. The report includes the following wondrous claim, reported in the BBC link above:

Over 2.4m women currently out-of-work want to work, while 1.3m want to boost their hours

What a pile of garbage. Surveys over many years have shown that most women would like to work fewer hours than they do. Indeed a recent survey of 1,200+ women, 25+ years old, in full-time work and with a partner, showed that 78% of them would happily give up work to be supported by a partner, but most felt under pressure from other women to be financially independent:

http://j4mb.wordpress.com/2013/05/15/most-british-women-would-pick-being-a-housewife-over-having-a-career/

I’ll put the discussion on our YouTube channel at some point in the coming few days.

Christina Hoff Sommers is the author of a number of important books including Who Stole Feminism? (1994) and The War Against Boys (2000). I’ve just learned of a short but fascinating piece by her, published on the blog of the American Enterprise Institute:

http://www.aei-ideas.org/2013/06/a-quick-fix-for-the-gender-wage-gap/

An excellent new article by Diana Davison was recently published on ‘A Voice for Men’:

http://www.avoiceformen.com/women/the-boardroom-bitches/

We’ve given the influential American MHR website ‘A Voice for Men’ an exclusive on the first prospective parliamentary candidate J4MB has selected for 2015, someone who contested the same parliamentary seat in 2010 for his own political party:

http://www.avoiceformen.com/mens-rights/justice-for-men-and-boys-party-arrives/

We wish him well. On 9 May I’ll be revealing – again through ‘A Voice for Men’ – the seat I’ll personally be contesting in 2015.

We need a lot more donations if we’re to hit our financial target for contesting 30 marginal seats in 2015. I ask you to donate whatever you can afford towards that goal (link below), and I remind you that nobody connected with the party draws any income from donations.

http://j4mb.wordpress.com/donate/

Thank you for your support of our efforts to make the future brighter for men and boys (and the women who love them).

Mike Buchanan

I’m on a roll social media-wise. Having established a Twitter account a few days ago, I’ve just set up a Facebook page with considerable support from a London-based MHRA, Richard Ford, who rejoices in the nickname ‘Black Fedora’. His two blogs are here:

http://sixmillionpounds.blogspot.co.uk

http://the-black-fedora.blogspot.co.uk

My Facebook page is here:

http://www.facebook.com/mike.buchanan.9066

I invite the subscribers to this blog (and other visitors) to invite me to become their ‘friends’.

People keep telling me I have to be on Twitter. I’ve finally succumbed to the pressure and set up an account, so if enough people ‘follow’ me – @MikeBuchanan11 – I’ll start tweeting and see if it’s a good investment of time.

Our political party Justice for Men & Boys (and the women who love them) plans to contest the top 30 Conservative marginal seats at the next general election, scheduled to take place in May 2015. We’ve contacted local papers in all 30 constituencies, seeking prospective parliamentary candidates, and we’ve already heard from a number of individuals, so we’ve started to draw up lists.

The seats are detailed at the end of this note. We’re also hoping to contest Witney (David Cameron), Camberwell & Peckham (Harriet Harman) and Twickenham (Vince Cable). All the main parties are equally and institutionally anti-male, so we plan to challenge incumbent governments’ MPs at general elections. Our objective is to make a sufficiently good showing – voting for J4MB will result in the party/parties in power losing seats – that we will minimise the likelihood of the same party being elected for more than one term. This will put 30+ years of the state’s relentless assaults on men’s and boys’ human rights firmly onto the political ‘radar’ in the UK for the first time. If you’re interested in standing as a candidate for J4MB in 2015, for any of these 30 seats – or possibly another – please email me at mb1957@hotmail.co.uk.

Finally, political campaigning costs money, so I am making a request for donations. Nobody connected with J4MB earns any income from it. You can donate through the link below.

http://j4mb.wordpress.com/donate/

Let me know if you’d like to set up a Direct Debit instead. Even a modest amount every month will generate a good sum in the two years we have before the 2015 general election. Thank you.

Top 30 marginal Conservative seats, 2010 general election

Seat	Majority	Runner-up   party (2010)
Warwickshire North	54	Labour
Camborne & Redruth	66	Lib Dem
Thurrock	92	Labour
Hendon	106	Labour
Oxford West &   Abingdon	176	Lib Dem
Cardiff North	194	Labour
Sherwood	214	Labour
Stockton South	332	Labour
Lancaster & Fleetwood	332	Labour
Broxstowe	389	Labour
Truro & Falmouth	435	Lib Dem
Newton Abbott	523	Lib Dem
Amber Valley	536	Labour
Wolverhampton South West	691	Labour
Waveney	769	Labour
Carlisle	853	Labour
Morecambe & Lunesdale	866	Labour
Weaver Vale	991	Labour
Harrogate &   Knaresborough	1,039	Lib Dem
Lincoln	1,058	Labour
Plymouth Sutton &   Devonport	1,149	Labour
Montgomeryshire	1,184	Lib Dem
Stroud	1,299	Labour
Brighton Kemptown	1,328	Labour
Bedford	1,353	Labour
Watford	1,425	Lib Dem
Dewsbury	1,526	Labour
Warrington South	1,553	Labour
Pudsey	1,659	Labour
Enfield North	1,692	Labour

This morning the government published its second annual review on ‘Women on Boards’:

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/182602/bis-13-p135-women-on-boards-2013.pdf

Soon after the Conservative-led coalition came to power in May 2010, David Cameron appointed the Labour peer Lord Davies of Abersoch to report on how (not whether) to increase female representation on boards. The resulting Davies Report (February 2011) was full of claims that increasing gender diversity in the boardroom (‘GDITB’) would lead to improved corporate financial performance, whilst providing not a shred of evidence for the claims. Campaign for Merit in Business (‘C4MB’) has since gathered overwhelming evidence to show that GDITB leads to declines in corporate financial performance. Our latest briefing paper on the matter:

https://c4mb.wordpress.com/improving-gender-diversity-on-boards-leads-to-a-decline-in-corporate-performance-the-evidence/

C4MB has been very active in challenging the government over its GDITB initiative. Can we see any evidence of our impact, when we look at this latest report? In my initial review of the document I cannot see a single claim that GDITB will – or even may – result in improved corporate financial performance. This is a major about-turn, and is effectively an admission that GDITB is nothing more than a social engineering exercise. So has the government taken the logical next step, and withdrawn its threat of legislated gender quotas on boards? Of course not. On page 9 of the new report we find:

Enlightened companies really are grasping this issue and doing their utmost to change the face of British boardrooms. However, they are being let down by others who feel that they can ignore this issue. The time has come for them to realise that they can’t. This is not an issue that is going to go away. Our initial strategy recognised that all companies are different and gave them the freedom to tackle this issue in their own way, making the right decisions for their companies. We still feel that this is the right approach for UK business. However, there is a very real danger that those companies who refuse to act now, by failing to put in place targets and polices, will force the hand of Government into imposing burdensome regulation upon all businesses.

I see that among the signatories of this new report is Professor Susan Vinnicombe, who leads Cranfield International Centre for Women Leaders. She was also a signatory to the original Davies Report. Surely the good professor would claim a causal link between GDITB and improved corporate financial performance? Er, no. I refer you to her admission to a House of Lords inquiry in 2012:

https://c4mb.wordpress.com/2012/07/20/a-remarkable-statement-by-a-leading-proponent-of-improved-gender-diversity-in-the-boardroom/

I didn’t catch David Cameron’s speech about our recently deceased former prime minister Margaret Thatcher this afternoon in the House of Common, but a supporter and generous donor, Gladys, emailed me the following:

David Cameron, in a speech in the House of Commons this afternoon, stated that Margaret Thatcher had ‘smashed through the glass ceiling’, or words to that effect. I almost dropped my cup of tea in disbelief at his feminist-friendly statement. Margaret Thatcher would have recoiled at the idea that any such thing as a glass ceiling existed. Nothing has been so damaging to female executives as the myth that a glass ceiling exists, or has ever existed. Talented and hardworking women have aways got to the senior reaches of business, and to the boardroom if good enough. The glass ceiling is a myth spun so as to justify driving poorly qualified women, often unwilling to work hard, into boardrooms. Many female executives today have an unbelievable sense of entitlement. The fact that almost all female FTSE100 directors are non-executives tell us all we need to know about the relative numbers of men and women qualified for FTSE100 boards.

I couldn’t agree more. Gladys’s email reminded me of one of Mrs Thatcher’s quotations:

I don’t want to get to a position where we have women in senior roles because they’re women, we want to have women because they are able and as well-equipped as men and sometimes better.

A remarkable woman, whatever you might think of her politics. Will we ever see her like again?

Good afternoon. I’ve appeared on ten radio programmes in the past four weeks, nine of them BBC radio programmes, the latest being Woman’s Hour. Public consciousness about the discriminations and disadvantages faced by men and boys in modern Britain is rising fast. All the programmes are downloadable here:

http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKhX1c3ow6BrzdzP3ydpeZQ/videos

We plan to contest the top 30 Conservative marginal seats in May 2015, as I explained in an open letter sent to David Cameron a month ago:

http://j4mb.wordpress.com/our-open-letter-to-david-cameron-march-2013/

I invite you to comment on our public consultation document (link below). If you’d like to do so, please let me know, and I’ll email you the ‘Word’ version.

http://j4mb.wordpress.com/our-public-consultation-exercise-2/

(Our proposals relating to the business sector can be found on pp. 13, 14.)

We’ve seen a steady increase in the number and average size of donations being made to the party, but there’s still a long way to go. Those associated with the party (including myself) draw no income from donations, which are used to cover costs associated with campaigning. We’ll need £15,000 to finance the deposits for 30 seats in the 2015 general election, and a lot more than that to run effective campaigns. I should like to appeal to you for a donation (link below) to help make the future brighter for British men and boys, and the women who love them. Thank you for your support.

http://j4mb.wordpress.com/donate/

Finally, I should like to take this opportunity to wish you and your loved ones a happy Easter.

Mike Buchanan

PARTY LEADER

JUSTICE FOR MEN & BOYS (AND THE WOMEN WHO LOVE THEM)

http://j4mb.wordpress.com

mb1957@hotmail.co.uk