ABSTRACT
During the passage of the Social Security Bill in December 1997, there was only one new Labour woman MP – Ann Cryer – among the 47 Labour MPs who voted against the cut in lone parent benefit.1 For some, the new Labour women MPs’ loyalty seemed to disprove the link between women’s descriptive and substantive representation: if the sex of our representatives matters, then a Bill that would disproportionately – and, arguably, negatively – affect women was where we might expect to see women MPs making a difference.
