More diversity in parliament 'is essential'

15th January 2010

Ensuring government accurately portrays the population of Britain in terms of diversity is fundamentally important.

This is the opinion of a spokesperson for the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), who stated that there is no room for discrimination in parliament.

"As MPs represent the public, we also want existing equality laws to be extended so that political parties are included along with other public bodies," the source stated.

The representative's remarks came in response to the publication of proposals put forward following the Speaker's Conference on the matter earlier this week.

In the document, the committee suggested removing Section 141 of the Mental Health Act, which removes any parliamentary member from their seat if they are held under the legislation for longer than six months.

According to the EHRC employee, the organisation welcomes the news that barriers to prevent those from certain demographics, including disabled people, from entering the political realm are being removed.

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