Representation of the People (Equal Franchise) Act 1928
The Representation of the People (Equal Franchise) Act 1928 gave women the Parliamentary vote on the same terms as men for the first time. It removed the qualifications of the Representation of the People Act 1918, which had given women … Read more
Lady Rhondda’s petition for women to sit in House of Lords, 1922
Viscountess Rhondda, a hereditary woman peer in her own right, was the first woman to petition to take her seat in the House of Lords. No woman had attempted this previously because of long-established custom and lack of precedent. Although … Read more
First Women Jurors, 1920
On 29 July 1920, The Times reported that ‘Women jurors were empaneled for the first time at the Bristol Quarter Sessions yesterday’. A jury of six women and six men had ‘adjudicated on six cases’. Prosecuting counsel used the unfamiliar … Read more
Industrial Courts Act 1919
The Industrial Courts Act 1919 established a permanent Industrial Court to provide voluntary arbitration in trade disputes. Section 1 provided that the Court should consist of independent persons, persons representing employers, persons representing workmen, and ‘in addition one or more … Read more
Parliament (Qualification of Women) Act 1918
The Parliament (Qualification of Women) Act 1918 enabled women to be elected to, sit and vote in the UK House of Commons. Women were previously barred as a matter of common law rather than statute law. It followed the Representation … Read more
Amendment to Canon C2 of the Canons of the Church of England
The amendment to Canon C2 of the Canons of the Church of England removed final barrier preventing the appointment of women as bishops, removing the final constitutional barrier to women’s full participation in parliament.
Electoral (Amendment) (Political Funding) Act 2012
The Electoral (Amendment) (Political Funding) Act 2012 provided a gender quota for general elections in Ireland.
Welsh Assembly Election 2003
In 2003, the National Assembly of Wales became the first legislative chamber to elect equal numbers of female and male Assembly Members.
Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act 2002
The Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act 2002 allowed UK parliamentary parties to select candidates based on gender in order to increase proportion of women in Parliament.
Edwards v A-G of Canada (1930)
Edwards v A-G of Canada, one of the so-called ‘Persons cases’ established that women were people in law for the first time.
The Foundation of the Association of Women Solicitors
‘The history of the AWS should serve as an inspiration and a warning. Impressively a small cohort of women solicitors… had succeeded in founding an organisation to support each other, had maintained it through economic recessions and war… But its subsequent gradual demise demonstrates how an organisation can all but disappear through a laudable desire for expansion coupled with an unrealistic reliance on income which was not self-generated.’
Elizabeth Cruickshank
Article 7 of the Covenant of the League of Nations 1919
As a direct result of women’s lobbying at the 1919 Peace Conference, Article 7 of the Covenant of the League of Nations stated that its Secretariat – an international civil service – would be open to both women and men.
Appointment of the First Women Justices of the Peace, 1919
After centuries of all-male law courts, the introduction of women JPs was not simply a legal landmark but a revolution. Today just over half of all JPs are women.
Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act 1919
The Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act 1919 made sex and marriage no longer an automatic bar to the professions and, in particular, enabled women to enter the legal and other professions.
A Pageant of Great Women
A Pageant of Great Women, by Cicely Hamilton, presented arguments for women’s enfranchisement.
Representation of the People Act 1918
The Representation of the People Act 1918 gave women over 30 the parliamentary vote.