World Menopause Month — House of Commons, 2021-10-21
Topic: Mixed Topics
Caroline Fiona Ellen Nokes (Independent, Unknown): It is a pleasure to be able to contribute to this debate to mark World Menopause Day earlier this week, and the whole of October being Menopause Awareness Month. The hon. Member for Swansea East (Carolyn Harris) is absolutely bang on: this is not a political issue. I pay tribute to her tireless work, and it is a privilege to follow her excellent contribution. She and I have become something of a tag team on this issue, and it was notable that when we went to request that the Backbench Business Committee give time for the debate, we were quite definitely discussing when, not if In July, the Women and Equalities Committee launched our inquiry into menopause in the workplace, and since then we have collected evidence from a wide range of sources about the impact that menopause can have on women and work. However, before I highlight some of the issues that we have so far uncovered, I want to make a quick comment about the menopause and Westminster, or more specifically, the menopause and Whitehall Back in 2018, I had the privilege to be a member of the employment taskforce, and I have never forgotten the introduction given by one of the most senior civil servants in Whitehall to one of those meetings, where he spoke of the economy being "menopausal"—like it is some sort of insult, as if it is something to be ashamed of or ridiculed. I challenged him then in the same way that we must all challenge it now, because we have to beat down that stigma, that taboo, and make sure that the menopause is something that we can actually celebrate. I am talking about those brilliant menopausal women who have contributed so much during the course of their careers up to that point; the ones who are approaching the peak of their careers; the ones who have learned the ropes, gained the experience, given confidence to those following behind them and been role models to younger colleagues; the ones who have demonstrated that you can do it. If we allow menopause to be an insult, we are saying that the women who have achieved are suddenly of no use any more, and that is not the case But the workplace can be phenomenally difficult when experiencing menopausal symptoms. Goodness, anywhere can be difficult, but a recent survey carried out by the Fawcett Society on behalf of Standard Chartered and the Financial Services Skills Commission, specifically about women in finance who are experiencing the menopause, highlighted some really stark findings. Over 50% of women are worried about taking on additional responsibilities because of the menopause—that is the promotion gone. Twenty-five per cent. of women considered leaving their career altogether because of the menopause—that is the job gone; that is the income gone We talk about 1 million women being lost to the workforce. Let that sink in: a million women. Those are experienced, talented, confident, knowledgeable women no longer playing a role in the boardroom and lost to the management tier—decades of experience and advice to younger colleagues simply gone. In stark economic terms, we cannot afford to let that happen. No business, no school, no fire service, no organisation, no Parliament can afford to lose its best and its most experienced The really scary thing about the evidence that my Committee has so far received is the number of requests for anonymity from women who want their evidence kept confidential because they are worried about its impact on their careers. That is not acceptable Yes, of course the menopause can be difficult. We will all have different symptoms at different times; some will be phenomenally lucky and have no symptoms at all, but some will have symptoms so severe that they cannot carry on at work. We have to break down the stigma and start the conversations so that I never again get an email like the one that I received from a company’s HR director because she did not want her name attached to evidence to the Committee; she wanted it kept private because she was scared about what would happen to her career if anybody in her organisation even thought that she was menopausal I cannot predict where the evidence will take the Committee or what recommendations we might make to the Government. We have not even started taking oral evidence, so we are some way off my beating a path to the Minister’s door, or to the door of Ministers in the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, to ask for change I do not wish to make out that everything is negative. Far from it: the hon. Member for Swansea East gave some fabulous examples of companies that are real trailblazers. In our evidence-taking, I have been completely candid with employers and said, "I want to hear the good as well as the bad—I want to be able to celebrate you and hold you up as a role model to other companies and organisations." We have already heard some of the names: Timpson, John Lewis, Tesco, PwC and all the companies that have signed the menopause workplace pledge organised by Wellbeing of Women and supported by Bupa. To all the companies and organisations such as the NAO, which invited me in to talk about the menopause as if I were some sort of expert—it should have had the hon. Lady, who is a far greater expert—I say thank you, because they are starting the conversations. They are just talking about it, and that is the first step Nowadays, I am pretty happy to talk to anybody about my menopause or perimenopause symptoms, whatever they are. My induction to that came from GB News, which bluntly came straight out with "What are your symptoms?" I had to give the answer, "I don’t know"—I do not know whether the sweats at night are the start of the menopause or a result of my absolute addiction to a 13.5-tog duvet, which could explain it. Even I baulked at the prospect of using the term "vaginal dryness" in the presence of the Countess of Wessex; others were not quite so reticent I am conscious of time, but I want to mention briefly an individual champion. She is not quite my constituent—she is just over the border in North West Hampshire—but Claire Hattrick in Andover runs clipboardclaire.com, a blog dedicated to giving help and advice to other women. In the past week, she has published a whole book on the subject; she is coming to Parliament next week to support the hon. Member for Swansea East, give me a copy of her booklet and make sure that together we champion the brilliant advice out there for menopausal and perimenopausal women and spread the word We women born in the late 1960s and early 1970s are the ones most likely to be going through the perimenopause or menopause now. We are determined to speak up, speak out and find paths through the menopause that work for us. We will not be hiding away, because although we might be a pretty unlikely bunch of revolutionaries, it is a revolution that we need.