City 'needs more women in business'

28/07/2010

MPs have claimed that London's Square Mile needs more females in senior positions in order to mitigate against another financial crisis in the future.

According to the Women In The City report, compiled by a cross-party group of MPs, a better gender balance could encourage colleagues to challenge each other more.

This, they suggest, would prevent the culture of "groupthink" - where people from the same background and similar experience avoid questioning decisions.

Chairman John McFall said: “Our work on the banking crisis highlighted the need for substantial improvement in corporate governance in the City. Diversity at the top is one way to challenge potentially dangerous ’groupthink.’

“We are not saying that had women been in charge, the crisis wouldn’t have happened, but we are highlighting the fact that women are poorly represented in the financial sector, particularly at senior level."

He added that it would be in the best interests of financial institutions to try to "boost female representation at senior level" and thus try to "embed diversity and challenge more deeply into the culture of banking".

The report also threw up other gender-related concerns including too few women on boards and a "significant" pay gap in financial services.