Must try harder
There are many all-party parliamentary groups or APPGs in the UK. APPGs are informal cross-party groups of UK parliamentarians that discuss a particular issue of concern. In 2022 there were 755 such groups, but fear not, we are only going to look at what one of them is saying – the Women and Work APPG.
Last month the group published a report on women and work – and you’ll never guess what it found: women-led businesses face ‘structural and cultural barriers to accessing capital.’ Who knew? Sarah Russell, co-chair of the APPG, reported that in 2024, 2% of equity funding went to female entrepreneurs, down from 2.5% the year before. More than 80% went to all-male teams. Just 15% of investment committee members are women, according to the report.
The report was published the day after a landmark review of women on boards showed ‘slow progress’ on increasing the number of women in top executive positions at the UK’s biggest companies. The FTSE Women Leaders Review found that women took up just 15.4% of executive director roles on the FTSE 350, compared to nearly half of non-executive director roles. There are just eight women CEOs on the FTSE 100, down from 10 in 2023. Can anyone please explain to me how such a reduction can be termed ‘progress’, however slow?
If the figures above were stable, there would be less cause for concern, but the downward trend, however marginal, is of course concerning. The APPG report has several proposals, including ensuring banks, venture capitalists and private investors track and report the genders of the founders whose business they finance.
Russell is reported as saying that ‘This isn’t just unfair – it’s economically nonsensical. If women started and scaled businesses at the same rate as men, the UK economy could see up to £250bn in new value. Reporting by gender shines a light on these gaps, holds investors accountable, and could unlock massive productivity gains.’
The APPG is not the only Parliamentary body monitoring this issue; the Women and Equalities Committee – a select committee of the House of Commons – has produced a report highlighting the difficulties facing female-led businesses in accessing capital. This has prompted the government to indicate that it would intervene in the venture capital industry to increase the number of women-led businesses raising finance ‘if the level of investment shows no sign of improvement’.
Of course, numbers and general data are one thing, but Anu Adebajo, the newly appointed CEO of Newton Venture Program has noted that this is only part of the challenge, saying ‘Reporting initiatives need to be rolled out alongside incentives that change behaviours.’ Her company provides education and training programmes for venture capitalists, so one hopes that her leadership skills will help effect these much-needed changes in business culture.
So there you have it: ‘Must try harder’ is the standard comment at the end of a school report, and it certainly applies here. If only there were more female CEOs in charge of the AI and tech companies to keep the ‘bros’ under control. And one final thought: could Zuckerberg’s toadying line about business needing more masculine energy have anything to do with it?
Oh dear. I’ve just been uplifted by Verity’s blog and now depressed by Barbara’s.
Naively, I’d hoped that things were looking up for women accessing capital, but there are still ‘structural and cultural barriers’… a phrase that needs unpicking.
Perhaps we should look at Zuckerberg and his desire for more ‘masculine energy’. Maybe put our faith into Government intervention?
Apologies Joyce for lowering the mood! But let’s be thankful we have these groups and committees who are monitoring the progress, or apparent lack in this instance.
Dame B