ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Sandi Toksvig - Broadcast personality, politician, author
Long revered in the UK for her wit and candor, Sandi Toksvig is now lending her familiar voice to a greater cause -- equality for women.

Why you should listen

Sandi Toksvig OBE is an award-winning writer, broadcaster and performer. She was born in Copenhagen, Denmark but grew up traveling the world with her family as they followed the work of her father, Claus Toksvig, Danish television's most famous foreign correspondent. Toksvig gave her own first television interview when she was six.  After graduating with a first class degree from Cambridge University she began her acting career first at Nottingham Playhouse and then the Open Air Theatre in Regent's Park.

Toksvig's first experience of live television was when she hosted and co-wrote the children's Saturday morning show "No 73," which she did for six years. Other TV followed including the improvisation show, "Whose Line is it Anyway?" and six years as team captain on "Call My Bluff." Toksvig is the new host of the BBC's entertainment show QI and is currently recording the eighth season hosting the game show "15-1" for Channel 4. She has also had recent acting cameos in "Call the Midwife" and "Up the Women." Toksvig is well known on BBC Radio 4 for her appearances on "I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue" as well as hosting "Excess Baggage" and the News Quiz.

Toksvig has also produced television. The current Playhouse Presents strand on Sky Arts was conceived by her and she produced and wrote much of the content for the first three years.

Toksvig has written over twenty books including fact and fiction for both children and adults. Her stage play, Bully Boy, was the opening production of London's newest theatre, the St James. The piece also had a successful run in Copenhagen. Her latest novel The End of the Sky, set on the Oregon Trail in 1847, will be published in 2017. It's a sequel to her last novel A Slice of the Moon about the Irish potato famine. Her new comedy play Silver Linings deals with society's attitudes to older women. It will open at the Rose Theatre in February 2017 before going on tour.  Toksvig has written a column for Good Housekeeping magazine for twenty years.

In March 2015, along with journalist Catherine Mayer, Toksvig co-founded Britain's newest political party, The Women’s Equality Party (WEP), which in one year of existence now has over 70 branches across the UK. WEP stood candidates in the London, Welsh and Scottish elections of May 2016.

Toksvig has many honorary degrees. She is the President of the Women of the Year Lunch, Chancellor of the University of Portsmouth and in 2014 she was made an Officer of the British Empire by the Queen.

More profile about the speaker
Sandi Toksvig | Speaker | TED.com
TEDWomen 2016

Sandi Toksvig: A political party for women's equality

Filmed:
920,342 views

Women's equality won't just happen -- not unless more women are put in positions of power, says Sandi Toksvig. In a disarmingly hilarious talk, Toksvig tells the story of how she helped start a new political party in Britain, the Women's Equality Party, with the express purpose of putting equality on the ballot. Now she hopes people around the world will copy her party's model and mobilize for equality.
- Broadcast personality, politician, author
Long revered in the UK for her wit and candor, Sandi Toksvig is now lending her familiar voice to a greater cause -- equality for women. Full bio

Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.

00:12
I am so excited to be here.
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Everything in America
is so much bigger than in Europe.
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Look at me -- I am huge!
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(Laughter)
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It's fantastic!
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And TED Talks -- TED Talks
are where everybody has great ideas.
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So the question is: Where do
those great ideas come from?
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Well, it's a little bit of debate,
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but it's generally reckoned
that the average person --
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that's me --
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has about 50,000 thoughts a day.
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Which is a lot,
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until you realize that 95 percent of them
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are the same ones you had the day before.
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(Laughter)
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And a lot of mine are really boring, OK?
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I think things like,
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"Oh! I know -- I must clean the floor.
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Oh! I forgot to walk the dog."
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My most popular:
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"Don't eat that cookie."
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01:00
(Laughter)
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So, 95 percent repetition.
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01:06
That leaves us with just a five percent
window of opportunity each day
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to actually think something new.
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01:14
And some of my new thoughts are useless.
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01:16
The other day I was watching
some sports on television,
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01:19
and I was trying to decide
why I just don't engage with it.
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Some of it I find curious.
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This is odd.
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(Laughter)
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Do you think it would be
worth being that flexible
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just to be able to see
your heel at that angle?
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01:33
(Laughter)
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And here's the thing:
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I'm never going to be able
to relate to that,
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because I'm never going
to be able to do it, OK?
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Well, not twice, anyway.
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(Laughter)
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But I'll tell you the truth.
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The truth is I have never been
any good at sport, OK?
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I've reached that wonderful age
when all my friends say,
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"Oh, I wish I was as fit
as I was when I was 18."
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And I always feel rather smug then.
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(Laughter)
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I'm exactly as fit as I was when I --
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(Laughter)
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(Applause)
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I couldn't run then. I'm certainly
not going to do it now.
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(Laughter)
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So then I had my new idea:
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Why not engage people like me in sport?
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I think what the world needs now
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is the Olympics for people
with zero athletic ability.
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(Laughter)
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Oh, it would be so much more fun.
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We'd have three basic rules, OK?
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Obviously no drugs;
no corruption, no skills.
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(Laughter)
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It would be --
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No, it's a terrible idea.
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And I also know why I don't engage
with sport when I watch it on television.
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It's because probably 97 percent of it
is about men running
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and men kicking things,
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men trying to look
neatly packaged in Lycra.
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There is --
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(Laughter)
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Not always successfully.
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There is --
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(Laughter)
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There is so little
female sport on television,
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that a young woman watching
might be forgiven for thinking,
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and how can I put this nicely,
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that the male member
is the very lever you need
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to get yourself off the couch
and onto a sports ground.
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(Laughter)
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The inequalities in sport
are breathtaking.
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So this is what happens to me:
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I have a brand new idea,
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and immediately I come back to an old one.
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The fact is, there is not now,
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nor has there ever been
in the whole of history,
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a single country in the world
where women have equality with men.
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Not one.
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196 countries,
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it hasn't happened
in the whole of evolution.
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So, here is a picture of evolution.
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(Laughter)
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We women are not even in it!
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(Laughter)
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It's a wonder men have been able
to evolve quite so brilliantly.
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So --
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(Laughter)
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It bugs me, and I know
I should do something about it.
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But I'm busy, OK?
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I have a full-on career,
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I've got three kids,
I've got an elderly mom.
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In fact, if I'm honest with you,
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one of the reasons I came out here
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is because TED Talks said
I could have 15 minutes to myself,
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and I never have that much time --
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(Laughter)
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(Applause)
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So I'm busy.
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And anyway, I already had a go
at changing the world.
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Here's the thing, OK?
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Everybody has inside themselves
what I call an "activation button."
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It's the button that gets
pressed when you think,
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"I must do something about this."
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It gets pressed for all sorts of reasons.
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04:44
Maybe you face some kind of inequality,
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or you've come across
an injustice of some kind,
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sometimes an illness strikes,
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or you're born in some way disadvantaged,
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or perhaps underprivileged.
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So I was born gay, OK?
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I've always known,
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I don't think my family
were the least bit surprised.
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Here is a picture of me aged four.
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I look cute,
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but inside I genuinely believed
that I looked like Clint Eastwood.
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(Laughter)
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So my activation button
was pressed when I had my kids --
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three wonderful kids,
born to my then-partner.
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Now here's the thing:
I work on television in Britain.
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By the time they were born,
I was already hosting my own shows
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and working in the public eye.
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I love what I do,
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but I love my kids more.
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And I didn't want them
to grow up with a secret.
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1994, when my son, my youngest was born,
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there was not, as far as I was aware,
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a single out, gay woman
in British public life.
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I don't think secrets are a good thing.
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I think they are a cancer of the soul.
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So I decided to come out.
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Everybody warned me
that I would never work again,
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but I decided it was
absolutely worth the risk.
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Well, it was hell.
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In Britain, we have a particularly vicious
section of the right-wing press,
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and they went nuts.
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And their hatred stirred up
the less stable elements of society,
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and we got death threats --
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enough death threats
that I had to take the kids into hiding,
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and we had to have police protection.
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And I promise you there were
many moments in the still of the night
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when I was terrified by what I had done.
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Eventually the dust settled.
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Against all expectation
I carried on working,
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and my kids were and continue
to be absolutely fantastic.
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I remember when my son was six,
he had a friend over to play.
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They were in the next room;
I could hear them chatting.
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The friend said to my son,
"What's it like having two mums?"
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I was a little anxious to hear,
so I leant in to hear and my son said,
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"It's fantastic,
because if one of them's sick,
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you've still got another one
to cook for you."
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(Laughter)
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So my activation button
for gay equality was pressed,
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and along with many, many others,
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I campaigned for years for gay rights,
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and in particular, the right to marry
the person that I love.
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In the end, we succeeded.
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And in 2014, on the day
that the law was changed,
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I married my wife,
who I love very much, indeed.
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(Applause)
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We didn't do it in a quiet way --
we did it on the stage
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at the Royal Festival Hall in London.
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It was a great event.
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The hall seats two-and-a-half
thousand people.
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We invited 150 family and friends,
then I let it be known to the public:
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anybody who wanted to come and celebrate,
please come and join us.
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It would be free to anybody
who wanted to come.
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Two-and-half thousand people turned up.
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(Applause)
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Every kind of person you can imagine:
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gays, straights, rabbis,
nuns, married people,
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black, white -- the whole
of humanity was there.
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And I remember standing
on that stage thinking, "How fantastic.
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Job done.
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Love triumphs.
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Law changed."
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And I --
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(Applause)
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And I genuinely thought
my activation days were over, OK?
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So every year in that same hall,
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I host a fantastic concert to celebrate
International Women's Day.
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We gather the world's only
all-female orchestra,
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we play fantastic music by forgotten
or overlooked women composers,
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we have amazing conductors --
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it's Marin Alsop there
from Baltimore conducting,
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Petula Clark singing --
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and I give a lecture on women's history.
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I love to gather inspirational stories
from the past and pass them on.
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Too often, I think history's what I call
the Mount Rushmore model.
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It looks majestic, but the women
have been entirely left out of it.
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And I was giving a talk in 2015
about the suffragettes --
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I'm sure you know those magnificent
women who fought so hard
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for the right for women
in Britain to vote.
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And their slogan was: "Deeds, not words."
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And boy, they succeeded,
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because women did indeed
get the vote in 1928.
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So I'm giving this talk about this,
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and as I'm talking, what I realized is:
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this was not a history
lecture I was giving;
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this was not something
where the job was done.
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This was something where
there was so much left to do.
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Nowhere in the world, for example,
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do women have equal representation
in positions of power.
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OK, let's take a very quick look
at the top 100 companies
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in the London Stock Exchange in 2016.
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Top 100 companies:
How many women running them?
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Seven. OK. Seven.
That's all right, I suppose.
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Until you realize that 17
are run by men called "John."
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(Laughter)
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There are more men called John
running FTSE 100 companies --
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(Laughter)
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than there are women.
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There are 14 run by men called "Dave."
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(Laughter)
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Now, I'm sure Dave and John
are doing a bang-up job.
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(Laughter)
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OK. Why does it matter?
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Well, it's that pesky business
of the gender pay gap.
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Nowhere in the world
do women earn the same as men.
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And that is never going to change
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unless we have more women
at the top in the boardroom.
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We have plenty of laws;
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the Equal Pay Act in Britain
was passed in 1975.
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Nevertheless, there are still
many, many women
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who, from early November
until the end of the year,
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by comparison to their male colleagues,
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are effectively working for free.
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In fact, the World Economic
Forum estimates
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that women will finally
get equal pay in ...
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2133!
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Yay!
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(Laughter)
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That's a terrible figure.
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And here's the thing:
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the day before I came out to give my talk,
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the World Economic Forum revised it.
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So that's good, because
that's a terrible -- 2133.
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Do you know what they revised it to?
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2186.
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(Laughter)
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Yeah, another 53 years, OK?
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We are not going to get equal pay
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in my grandchildren's
grandchildren's lives
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under the current system.
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And I have waited long enough.
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I've waited long enough
in my own business.
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In 2016 I became the very
first woman on British television
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to host a prime-time panel show.
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Isn't that great? Wonderful, I'm thrilled.
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But --
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(Applause)
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But 2016! The first!
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Television's been around for 80 years!
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(Laughter)
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It may be television's not so important,
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but it's kind of symptomatic, isn't it?
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11:45
2016, the UN were looking
for a brand new ambassador
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11:49
to represent women's empowerment
and gender equality,
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and who did they choose?
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Wonder Woman.
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Yes, they chose a cartoon, OK?
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(Laughter)
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12:01
Because no woman was up to the job.
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12:05
The representation of women
in positions of power is shockingly low.
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12:10
It's true in Congress, and it's certainly
true in the British Parliament.
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12:13
In 2015, the number of men
elected to the Parliament that year
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was greater than the total number of women
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12:21
who have ever been members of Parliament.
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12:24
And why does it matter?
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Here's the thing:
if they're not at the table --
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12:27
literally, in Britain, at that table
helping to make the laws --
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12:30
do not be surprised if the female
perspective is overlooked.
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12:35
It's a great role model for young people
to see a woman in charge.
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3332
12:38
In 2016, Britain got its second
female Prime Minister;
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12:41
Theresa May came to power.
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1639
12:43
The day she came to power
she was challenged:
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12:45
just do one thing.
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1194
12:46
Do one thing in the first
100 days that you're in office
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12:50
to try and improve
lives for women in Britain.
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2941
12:52
And what did she do? Nothing.
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1997
12:55
Nothing.
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12:56
Because she's much too busy
cleaning up the mess the boys made.
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3565
13:00
Even having a female leader,
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13:02
they always find something better to do
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13:05
than to sort out the pesky
issue of inequality.
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13:08
So I keep talking about equality
like it matters. Does it?
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13:11
Well, let's take a very quick look
at the STEM industries, OK?
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13:14
So science, technology,
engineering and mathematics.
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13:17
Pretty much important in every
single aspect of our daily lives.
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There is the thickest and most incredibly
well-documented glass ceiling
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13:28
in the STEM industries.
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13:30
What if the cure for cancer
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1984
13:32
or the answer the global warming
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lies in the head of a young female
scientist who fails to progress?
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4945
13:39
So I thought all these things,
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2832
13:42
and I knew I had to do "Deeds, not words."
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13:47
And I spoke to my wonderful friend,
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1971
13:49
brilliant journalist
Catherine Mayer in Britain,
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2727
13:52
and we rather foolishly --
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13:54
and I suspect there was wine involved --
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3202
13:57
(Laughter)
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13:59
We decided to found
a brand new political party.
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3645
14:02
Because here's the critical thing:
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14:04
the one place women and men
are absolutely equal is at the ballot box.
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4898
14:09
We had no idea what we were doing,
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1621
14:11
we didn't know how complicated
it was to start a political party.
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3098
14:14
I thought, "It can't be that difficult,
men have been doing it for years."
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14:18
(Laughter)
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2157
14:20
So we started by calling it
"The Women's Equality Party."
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5286
14:26
And straightaway people said to me,
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1701
14:27
"Why did you call it that?"
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1454
14:29
I said, "I don't know,
I just thought we'd be clear."
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3082
14:32
(Laughter)
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2516
14:39
I didn't want what we were doing
to be a secret, you know? I just --
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3429
14:43
(Laughter)
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1293
14:44
Some people said, "You can't call it that!
It's much too feminist!"
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3226
14:47
Ooh! Scary word! Ahh!
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1828
14:50
I can't tell you how many times
I've heard somebody say,
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3107
14:53
"I'm not a feminist, but ..."
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2174
14:55
And I always think
if there's a "but" in the sentence,
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2611
14:58
it can't all be roses in the garden.
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1769
15:00
And then I started getting asked
the hilarious question,
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2650
15:03
"Are you all going to burn your bras?"
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1914
15:05
Yes! Because bras are famously
made of flammable material.
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3615
15:09
(Laughter)
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1754
15:12
That's why all women spark when they walk.
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2818
15:14
(Laughter)
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1729
15:19
Here's quick history sidebar for you:
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3300
15:23
no woman ever burnt her bra in the '60s.
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2535
15:25
It's a story made up by a journalist.
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1822
15:27
Thank goodness journalism
has improved since then.
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2625
15:30
So --
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1155
15:31
(Laughter)
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1358
15:33
I announced what we were going
to do in a broadcast interview,
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2918
15:35
and straightaway,
the emails started coming.
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2102
15:38
First hundreds,
then thousands and thousands,
340
926086
2243
15:40
from every age group: from the very young
to women in their '90s,
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3800
15:44
to hundreds of wonderful men.
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1382
15:45
People wrote and said,
"Please, can I help?
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933583
2012
15:47
Please, can I visit you
at party headquarters?"
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2216
15:49
We didn't have a headquarters --
we didn't have a party!
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2668
15:52
We didn't have anything.
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940551
1198
15:53
All we had was a wonderful,
tight group of fabulous friends
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3899
15:57
trying to answer emails
pretty much 24-7 in our pajamas.
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4685
16:03
We were all busy.
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1151
16:04
Many of us had careers,
many of us had children,
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2286
16:06
but we did what women do,
and we shared the work.
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2735
16:09
And almost instantly, we agreed
on certain fundamental things.
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3438
16:12
First thing: we want to be
the only political party in the world
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3492
16:16
whose main aim was
to no longer need to exist.
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2705
16:19
That's a fantastic idea.
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1805
16:20
We wanted to be the only political party
with no particular political leaning.
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3830
16:24
We wanted people from the left,
from the right, from the middle,
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3097
16:27
every age group.
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1152
16:29
Because the whole point
was to work with a simple agenda:
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2815
16:31
let's get equality
in every aspect of our lives,
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3219
16:35
and when we're finished,
361
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1156
16:36
let's go home and get
the other chores done.
362
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2235
16:38
(Laughter)
363
986543
1082
16:39
And we wanted to change
how politics is conducted.
364
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2407
16:42
I don't know if you have this,
365
990080
1483
16:43
but in Britain we have
two major political parties.
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2437
16:46
They're the dinosaurs of politics.
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1648
16:47
And how they speak to each other
is shameful and poisonous.
368
995720
3538
16:51
I'm sure you've never had
that kind of name-calling --
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999735
2618
16:54
(Laughter)
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1345
16:56
And lying here.
371
1004546
1617
16:59
Wouldn't it be great
if just one politician said,
372
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2369
17:01
"Do you know, my opponent has a point.
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1895
17:03
Let's see if we can't work together
and get the job done."
374
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3399
17:06
(Applause)
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4517
17:13
And let's get more women
into politics, OK?
376
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2413
17:15
Let's immediately get
more women into politics
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2174
17:17
by being the only political party
to offer free childcare to our candidates,
378
1025798
3686
17:21
so they can get out of the house
and start campaigning.
379
1029508
2673
17:24
(Applause)
380
1032205
2256
17:27
Within 10 months,
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1035596
2426
17:30
we had more than 70 branches
of our party across the UK.
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3948
17:34
We stood candidates for election
in London, Scotland and Wales
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1042018
3159
17:37
in May 2016.
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1045201
1564
17:38
One in 20 people voted
for our candidate for London Mayor.
385
1046789
3545
17:42
And when the men in the race
saw how many votes we were attracting,
386
1050358
5193
17:47
wonder of wonders,
387
1055575
1174
17:48
they began to talk about the need
to tackle gender equality.
388
1056773
4330
17:53
(Applause)
389
1061127
3060
17:59
You know, I've been promised
change since I was a child.
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1067588
2648
18:02
It was always coming:
391
1070260
1057
18:03
women were going to stand
shoulder to shoulder with men.
392
1071341
2698
18:06
All I got were empty promises
and disappointment --
393
1074063
2483
18:08
enough disappointment
to found a political party.
394
1076570
3370
18:11
But here is my new idea for today --
this is my five percent, OK?
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3106
18:15
And this one is really good.
396
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1599
18:16
The fact is, this is not enough.
397
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2746
18:19
It is not enough to found one political
party for equality in a single country.
398
1087487
5062
18:24
What we need is a seismic change
in the global political landscape.
399
1092573
4547
18:29
And the wonderful thing
about the model we have created
400
1097144
2694
18:31
is that it would work anywhere.
401
1099862
1875
18:33
It would work in America,
402
1101761
1660
18:35
it would work in Australia,
it would work in India.
403
1103445
2394
18:37
It's like we've made the perfect recipe:
anybody can cook it,
404
1105863
2907
18:40
and it's good for everybody.
405
1108794
1396
18:42
And we want to give it away.
406
1110214
1623
18:43
If you want to know what we did,
we're giving it away.
407
1111861
2718
18:46
Can you imagine if we could mobilize
millions of women across the world
408
1114603
5614
18:52
to say, "That's enough!"
to the traditional battles of politics?
409
1120241
3318
18:55
To say, "Stop the bickering,
let's get the work done."
410
1123583
3034
18:58
We could literally change the world.
411
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3307
19:01
And I want that.
412
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1417
19:03
(Applause)
413
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3412
19:08
I want ...
414
1136707
1373
19:10
(Applause)
415
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1451
19:12
I want that for our daughters,
416
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2470
19:14
and I want it for our sons.
417
1142538
1503
19:16
Because the fact is:
equality is better for everyone.
418
1144065
4392
19:20
Come on people, let's activate!
Let's change the world!
419
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2931
19:23
I know we can do it, and it wants doing!
420
1151436
2856
19:26
(Applause)
421
1154316
4499

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ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Sandi Toksvig - Broadcast personality, politician, author
Long revered in the UK for her wit and candor, Sandi Toksvig is now lending her familiar voice to a greater cause -- equality for women.

Why you should listen

Sandi Toksvig OBE is an award-winning writer, broadcaster and performer. She was born in Copenhagen, Denmark but grew up traveling the world with her family as they followed the work of her father, Claus Toksvig, Danish television's most famous foreign correspondent. Toksvig gave her own first television interview when she was six.  After graduating with a first class degree from Cambridge University she began her acting career first at Nottingham Playhouse and then the Open Air Theatre in Regent's Park.

Toksvig's first experience of live television was when she hosted and co-wrote the children's Saturday morning show "No 73," which she did for six years. Other TV followed including the improvisation show, "Whose Line is it Anyway?" and six years as team captain on "Call My Bluff." Toksvig is the new host of the BBC's entertainment show QI and is currently recording the eighth season hosting the game show "15-1" for Channel 4. She has also had recent acting cameos in "Call the Midwife" and "Up the Women." Toksvig is well known on BBC Radio 4 for her appearances on "I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue" as well as hosting "Excess Baggage" and the News Quiz.

Toksvig has also produced television. The current Playhouse Presents strand on Sky Arts was conceived by her and she produced and wrote much of the content for the first three years.

Toksvig has written over twenty books including fact and fiction for both children and adults. Her stage play, Bully Boy, was the opening production of London's newest theatre, the St James. The piece also had a successful run in Copenhagen. Her latest novel The End of the Sky, set on the Oregon Trail in 1847, will be published in 2017. It's a sequel to her last novel A Slice of the Moon about the Irish potato famine. Her new comedy play Silver Linings deals with society's attitudes to older women. It will open at the Rose Theatre in February 2017 before going on tour.  Toksvig has written a column for Good Housekeeping magazine for twenty years.

In March 2015, along with journalist Catherine Mayer, Toksvig co-founded Britain's newest political party, The Women’s Equality Party (WEP), which in one year of existence now has over 70 branches across the UK. WEP stood candidates in the London, Welsh and Scottish elections of May 2016.

Toksvig has many honorary degrees. She is the President of the Women of the Year Lunch, Chancellor of the University of Portsmouth and in 2014 she was made an Officer of the British Empire by the Queen.

More profile about the speaker
Sandi Toksvig | Speaker | TED.com