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" Suella Fernandes - a barrister, co\u2013founder of a Brent-based school and trustee of the Africa Justice Foundation who has been involved in politics for almost ten years, has missed out on a position as MP for Bexhill because of (according to local Conservative councillor John Barnes) the &amp;quot;double whammy of being brown and a woman.&amp;quot;   Yep, despite admitting that Fernandes had put on a &amp;quot;wowzer performance on the night,&amp;quot; apparently her race and gender were &amp;#039;handicaps&amp;#039;.  Mr Barnes said:   &amp;quot;The double whammy of being brown and a woman probably handicaps her still. &amp;quot;I think if Suella was up against less strong opposition, it wouldn&amp;#039;t have been held against her but when you are battling three good men.&amp;quot;  Words fail us.  But before you start frothing at the mouth with rage at bumbling idiot Barnes, he&amp;#039;s actually (albeit unwittingly) highlighted an important issue. The Tories have just 11 black or Asian MPs, and of 303 Tory MPs, shockingly only 48 are women. Labour&amp;#039;s stats don&amp;#039;t fare much better, with 16 MPs from ethnic backgrounds and 86 female MPs out of a total 257. Isn&amp;#039;t it time that changed? Fingers crossed, the media storm surrounding Fernandes&amp;#039;s loss will prompt that change. Failing that, perhaps we could petition for a white paper for Vagina Benefits instead? "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.cosmopolitan.co.uk/reports/news/a31889/candidate-misses-out-brown-woman/>