I've had a similar thing from my union. An election (I think for the national committee) where there are 8 candidates. I can vote for three, but I have to vote for at least one woman. So that's not completely undermining the democratic principle at all then.

I don't know off the top of my head. I know that as well as your white collar types like me they represent a lot of areas which are lower paid and have a lot of women - I often get mailshots about their efforts towards equal pay for example.

I have no objection to them working towards improving the lot of their female members, in fact if they said 'we're going to put 60% of our efforts towards improving the lot of our female members because they need it most' I'd be fine with that. However I do have two objections to the constraint on the voting

1) It implies that either the best representative for women has to by definition be a woman or that a woman in such a post can by definition do something that a man cannot. I consider this to be sexist, and rubbish to boot.

2) As I said, it's a betrayal of one of the basic principles of democracy. If an election is not free - i.e. I am not free to vote for whoever I wish among the candidates - then it is not an election worth the name.

If you look at it the other way, let's say you have 40% women overall, rising to 80% in the manual jobs. If a council is elected with absolutely no women is it:
- because women aren't interested in governance?
- because women candidate were less good?
- because there is a bias that men in suits look more knowledgeable and authoritative than women?
It's an interesting problem.In France 50% women on election lists has been a requirement since 2000, at first there was whining, but now a lot of very knowledgeable women have risen to the task.

Here's the thing : I consider the presence or lack of a Y chromosome to be utterly irrelevant to somebody's competence as a union official. If women aren't interested, I don't want them doing the job. I don't want anybody representing me if they aren't interested in doing so. If they're less good than the other candidates, I don't want them doing the job either, because I want the best person available doing the job for me.

The last would be a valid consideration in e.g. a general election where there's widespread media coverage and the candidates go out of their way to give that impression - but this election is in that sense 'blind', you just get a written piece by each candidate and a small biog. You don't get to see whether they look authoritative in a suit or not.

As I say, I find it a very odd form of democracy that constrains who I am or am not allowed to vote among the list of candidates for when handing me the ballot paper. If a there's a woman on the candidate list whose info suggests she's knowledgeable. enthusiastic and could do a good job, I'll happily vote for her. I kind of resent being told I have to, apparently on the basis that I'm a sexist idiot who would simply discount all women unless I'm forced to do otherwise.

I'm think a lot of people would be happy electing a woman if she's good for the position, but a lot fewer will pick a woman out of choice if all candidates are much of the same.