As Andy Burnham prepares to become the UK's next prime minister, he faces calls to tackle Labour's alleged "boys’ club" by ensuring women get half of the top jobs in his first cabinet.
The Labour Party — despite having more equality mechanisms in place than the main opposition Conservatives — has yet to elect its first female leader.
By contrast, Tory party leader Kemi Badenoch is the fourth woman to lead her party after former prime ministers Margaret Thatcher, Theresa May and Liz Truss.
Women in the Labour Party reportedly feel a "boys’ club" is blocking their progress.
Labour stalwart Harriet Harman earlier this year urged outgoing premier Keir Starmer to appoint a woman as his de facto deputy to "transform the political culture in government" around women.
"We need less lads, lads, lads, and more diversity," Labour lawmaker Polly Billington told LBC radio earlier this month.
Billington hinted at the anger behind the scenes when questioned about speculation Burnham could parachute former Labour foreign minister David Miliband back into frontline politics.
"I don't really need to be organising or advocating for a reunion of the Demon Eyes football club," she said, referring to a 1998 football team made up of a generation of Tony Blair-era political advisers and future ministers.
Miliband, who left UK politics and has been based in New York since 2013, is Burnham’s former Demon Eyes teammate.
Other former team members include James Purnell, a former pensions minister who Burnham is reportedly considering as his chief of staff, and Ed Balls, another former minister who has left politics, who is also tipped for a possible return.
Deputy party leader Lucy Powell told The Guardian daily she had experienced "unpleasant" briefings in Downing Street against senior female cabinet ministers.
She said she viewed them as evidence of a "boys’ club" in the upper echelons of government.
