Page 13 - BPWUK - E-news - Edition 106 - October 2022

PAST EVENT

Lesley Abdela MBE — ”Glimpses into the future”

BPW members ZOOMed in from all corners of the globe, including California, Nepal
and New Zealand to join in this presentation by Lesley Abdela MBE, a tireless cam-
paigner on women’s rights in political participation and gender issues.

Introduced by Sylvia Perry, past BPW national and international President, who had
known Lesley since 1980 when Lesley was setting up the 300 group, who spoke of
Lesley’s enthusiasm for advocacy. Drawing on her wealth of experience as a jour-
nalist, war correspondent, author, political editor and broadcaster, Lesley’s talk
would promote active discussion on four topics:

1 the 300 group on women in politics

Founder of the cross-party 300 Group campaigning for more women to enter parlia-
ment in 1979, Lesley was encouraged to form the organisation by women, in the
lobby at Westminster, campaigning on the rights to an abortion. Within a couple of
years there were 43 groups nationwide. All the women were volunteers, working
from homes and local facilities. Their first conference took place on a DFDS new fer-
ry sailing between the UK and Denmark.

The election of Margaret Thatcher that same year saw just 19 women become Mem-
bers of Parliament (MP) out of a total of 635. Lesley took the lead in arranging a
meeting on how to take action. The Gingerbread office was used and while the wom-
en’s organisations discussed the important issues, no one focussed on how to get
women into parliament. An invitation then went out to all known women’s groups,
including BPW UK. Lesley booked a committee room in the Houses of Parliament and
400 women turned up. A woman police officer also cautioned her for putting up
posters in the toilets of a palace, of which Westminster is one.