Today is International Women’s Day 2022.

The push for gender equality continues, and has both supporters and detractors. Supporters are often passionate while detractors tend to be passive; it is the passive resistance that is insidious within workplaces and prevents more complete and faster equality. From 2009-2013 I was lucky enough to live and work in Norway for 4 years where amongst other things parents tended to split the parental leave 50% to mum and 50% to dad, which was a refreshing change and gave food for thought.

First established in 1910 and 1911, how ironic that 8^th March was chosen for International Women’s Day because this was the date in 1917, over 100 years ago, that thousands of women took to the streets of Petrograd (now St. Petersburg) in Russia to demand an end to food shortages and World War I, one of the most significant International Women’s Day protests. It is both depressing and revealing to think how far we have come in some respects and how little has changed in other respects given current events in Russia and Ukraine.

At Weston Hospicecare, fully 84% of our paid staff are women and 80% of our volunteers are women. I believe there is room to celebrate our gender differences while simultaneously embracing our equality; different doesn’t mean better or worse, it means different and we are stronger together with that diversity of skills and thinking. One could argue that our hospice would benefit from a more equal female/male balance of staff, but I am pleased that our senior management team and board of trustees have quite equal representation.

Thank goodness for women, where would Weston Hospicecare be without you? Today we celebrate you and reaffirm our push for true equality.