Celebrating International Women’s Day 2021

Mar 7

Today, Monday 8th March 2021, marks International Women’s Day, an annual celebration of the incredible contribution women make to society and the world. In the words of feminist and journalist, Gloria Steinem:

"The story of women's struggle for equality belongs to no single feminist nor to any one organisation, but to the collective efforts of all who care about human rights."

The Gender Inclusion Network is proud to recognise and celebrate this annual event, and support this year’s theme “choose to challenge”. From challenge, comes change, which is why we encourage all our members, colleagues and friends to stand with us and challenge all forms of inequality. We encourage you to challenge and call out gender bias and inequality in all its forms, and seek out and celebrate women's achievements.

Collectively, we can all help create an inclusive world.

The world we live in today is not equal

Sadly we all have to acknowledge that the society we live in today has not yet achieved equality for all, and women are often marginalised in positions of power and authority. This makes the need for change even greater.

Indeed, in our own insurance industry, the gender pay gap is nearly double the national average at 30%. And this isn’t just a problem for women, its a problem for the UK economy too. According to Rose Review, increasing the number of female entrepreneurs in the UK could add an additional £250 billion to the country’s economy.

That’s why today, as well as celebrating the incredible contributions of women across our industry, we want to shine a light on a few statistics that recognise the inequality women are faced with today.