100 years ago, a suffragette from Northumberland called Emily Wilding Davison died when she fell beneath the King’s horse at the Derby. It was a pivotal moment in the history of women campaigning for the right to vote.
In 1913, Emily died from injuries caused when drawing attention to the Suffragette cause.
But a century on, do the actions of the suffragettes mean anything to young women’s lives today?
Well the BBC’s Sunday Politics wanted to find out what the next generation of female voters think about politics. What issues do they care about? And do they think politicians care about them?
So – with funding and support from BBC Outreach – we joined forces with Ashington High School, not far from the birthplace of Emily Wilding Davison.
Around a dozen teenagers were invited to the central library in Newcastle to share their thoughts about women and politics at an event chaired by the programme’s presenter, Richard Moss.
A senior archivist at the Parliamentary Archives, Mari Takayanagi, told the often violent story of the suffragettes - while Parliament’s education service ran a workshop to help the students better understand the workings of Parliament.
We also invited one of the youngest female MPs in the House of Commons to talk about her experiences. Bridget Phillipson joined the Labour party at 15 and was elected MP for Houghton and Sunderland South at the last General Election aged just 26.
MP for Houghton and Sunderland South
The students got the chance to question her about life in the Commons and discuss their own views on politics and whether they’d ever consider a political career in the future.
It may be a century since the suffragettes, but Bridget reminded them that – with women making up only 20 per cent of the Commons – there was a long way to go.
As a BBC editor, I found the day offered a rare opportunity to hear the views of young women talking about their own lives and ambitions. We’ll be further developing our relationship with them with a trip to Parliament in the spring.
The film can be viewed on the Sunday Politics on Sunday 10th March 2013 at 11am on BBC One.
*BBC Outreach works across the North to encourage local TV and radio teams to run projects that bring them face to face with their audiences while fulfilling our six Public Purposes using our non-broadcast work.
