Greg Wright: The lack of women in engineering is hurting our economy

FANS of modern theatre may recall a play called “Blue Stockings” by Jessica Swale, which chronicled the colossal obstacles faced by female science scholars at Girton College, Cambridge in the 1890s.

Apart from facing male academics who believed that “mental taxation in a woman can lead to atrophy, mania, or worse”, the women left empty-handed after completing their studies, despite matching the men grade for grade.

At the time, women didn’t have the right to graduate. The play, which attracted packed houses at Shakespeare’s Globe in the late summer of 2013, is a tub thumping piece which shows how the sexism of late Victorian England led to a criminal waste of human potential.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Steps have been taken to improve equality since then, but too many corporate sectors still seem to have an invisible “men only” sign hanging over the door. For example, just one in 20, or 5.7 per cent, of professional engineers are female, and research from WISE, which campaigns to promote women in science, technology and maths roles- or STEM - found that just 13 per cent of people working in occupations classed as STEM were women.

So what’s the solution? Helen Wollaston, the director of the WISE campaign, believes that a national strategy must be devised involving industry and academia to boost the numbers of women in science and engineering roles. After all, if we can devise policies to combat climate change, surely we must be capable of breaking down the barriers that stop women from choosing careers in science?

Sam Smethers, the chief executive of the Fawcett Society, the charity that promotes gender equality, believes the under-representation of women in STEM jobs undermines UK productivity. She added: “These are the types of high skill roles that will make up a big part of the future jobs mix in the UK. If women aren’t part of that growth we’ll see the gender pay gap widen..and we will also see businesses suffer and become less competitive.”

“We’ve got to tackle the dated idea that engineering is a man’s job.”

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Belinda Phipps, the chair of the Fawcett Society, said she was disappointed that there were no measures in the Budget to encourage more women into male dominated science subjects.

Griselda Togobo, the managing director at Forward Ladies, the Yorkshire-based networking organisation, believes parents, teachers and employers must be mobilised to support gender diversity.

She said: “Being one of the few girls who studied physics, mathematics and chemistry myself, I ended up abandoning the dream of a life-long career in engineering due to various reasons - some of which related to the working environment and the prospects of progression within the industry, which is highly male-dominated, and has a reputation for not being family friendly.”

As Ms Togobo observes, the UK is facing a drastic shortage of skills within the STEM industries. ‘The State of Engineering’ report from Engineering UK predicted that the shortage of skills in STEM fields could cost the UK economy up to £27bn a year.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“Companies need to be hiring 182,000 engineers annually until 2022 - where are they going to find these engineers?’’ Ms Togobo said. “Encouraging more females into the industry is one way that the Government can bridge this gap.

“It seems our failure to inspire girls into these fields is directly hurting the economy, and also cutting us off from a pool of potential talent.”

The battle for hearts and minds begins at home.

Outdated perceptions must be challenged.

Parents must tell their daughters that engineering no longer belongs to the world of rags and spanners.

Like the female scholars of Girton, we must embrace innovation with an open, fearless mind.

Related topics: