I thank my hon. Friend for that comment. I understand that the management board and Ministers in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills were invited to do unconscious bias training, although I believe that the only Minister who was able to do it was my hon. Friend the Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson). I agree that we should be proactive. There are companies that have offered to run courses for MPs. That has been on my to-do list for some time, and I will ensure that it gets done.
Our report recommended that companies should normalise flexible and part-time working. We should encourage companies to review their culture so talent does not drain away from the pipeline unnecessarily. Evidence shows that the best way to make flexible
working a standard practice is to ensure that it is a non-gender issue. Companies know that they have a role in inspiring members of the next generation in the subjects they take and their career choices.
Finally, I come to our recommendation about head-hunters, for whom there is already a voluntary code of conduct. I want to draw Members’ attention to the review undertaken by Charlotte Sweeney at the instigation of the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, my right hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Vince Cable). It was launched earlier this week, and it looks at the voluntary code of conduct.
Head-hunters can play a significant role in helping us to reach Lord Davies’s target of ensuring that 25% of board members are female. I welcome the report’s ambition that the code should be a minimum standard and that we should aspire for more. To achieve that, we must encourage as many head-hunters as possible to sign up to the code.
One way of promoting the code is for the Government to lead by example. I am encouraging the Cabinet Office to ensure that all head-hunters used by the Government and their agencies are signatories to the code. We know that currently they are not. I had a conversation with my right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden about that issue, and I will take it up further.