The Big Questions: What are the challenges for women in journalism? Can character be taught in schools?

This week's Big Questions are answered by journalist International Women's Forum UK founder founder Katharine Whitehorn

You are a founder member of the International Women’s Forum UK, which celebrates 25 years in May. What has it achieved, and what are the challenges that lie ahead?

When we started, the most startling thing it gave some of the women was real female friends. And quite soon there was a certain amount of professional networking and swapping of contacts and information. But most of all our dinners, and later short foreign trips, were just enormously enjoyable occasions. For us, the forum became the kind of non-domestic network of kindred spirits that men have always had in their clubs.

According to recent figures, more women than men are now enrolling at university. How do you view this development?

I’m inclined to think this is the kind of thing that changes if not from year to year then maybe every five years, but whether it’s odd or sad depends on what happens to the ones who don’t go to university. You could argue that girls need a professional label more than young men, because the tendency to assume they’ll just get married and quit – or even if not married still need maternity leave – is still all too common, and makes them less employable.

You blazed a trail in journalism that other women journalists followed, but opinion pages and editors’ chairs are still dominated by men. What’s the answer?

Too many top journalistic jobs still filled by men? Well, yes – but influence doesn’t always follow the job description. All really good editors are worth their weight in gold whatever sex they are. One of the best I ever had was a man – George Seddon on The Observer, who invented me. And the best one I’ve had since him is Ruaridh Nicoll. Great women editors include Barty Phillips, and to an extent Shirley Conran was a marvellous editor. Though it was Mary Stott on The Guardian who changed writing for women for all of us with women’s pages that reflected all the things women care about, not just the frilly things.

David Cameron has been accused of failing to respond to the floods until they struck Tory heartlands. Is the criticism fair?

It’s a bit over-simple to assume that only the thought of his true-blue followers getting wet caused Cameron to react to the floods; it won’t be clear for quite a while just exactly who should have done what to prevent those disasters. You’d need a fairly detailed council-by-council inquiry to establish where a natural catastrophe should have been foreseen. What might be more interesting is to consider whether these floods tell us something that ought to alarm us all about climate change in general, to which, I would think, no politician would respond until they had to.

Shadow Education Secretary Tristram Hunt thinks that “character, creativity and resilience” can be taught in England’s schools. Is he right?

A really good teacher can teach anything – but not necessarily all at once. And the way the question is put seems to imply that an instruction from on high could ensure that teachers should simply put these qualities on the syllabus, and a nation endowed with such admirable qualities would somehow emerge. Which is fairly absurd.

In a society in which such things were valued by parents and teachers alike, one might hope that kids would get the idea that these values were important – or at least as important as money or blue blood or skill at kicking a ball into a net.

Hillary Clinton is increasingly being talked of as America’s next president. How do you view this prospect?

I didn’t hope Hillary Clinton would win when she first ran for president because the first female president should not, I felt, seem to get it even partly for having been the wife of someone – and to have the first black president seemed more of a triumph. But since then, Hillary has definitely made her own mark, and I see no reason why she shouldn’t take her place along with Angela Merkel and the head of the International Monetary Fund, Christine Lagarde.

Lord Grade says the BBC is far too big and should outsource most of its programmes, including dramas and documentaries, to the private sector. Is he right?

The BBC already uses stacks of small companies, and its reputation for an ethos of fairness – or an attempt at it – remains intact. But this remark is just the usual recitation of the creed that of course anything done privately and for money must always be better, freer and of higher quality than anything done with an ethos that attempts to work for the public good.

It amazes me that while anyone who believes in co-operative or communal values is thought of as a bigoted believer, those whose faith is in the usefulness and power of the market and monetary incentive consider themselves entirely impartial. Weird.

Do you agree with banning smoking in cars in which children are travelling?

No. The amount of smoke the child might absorb over the driver’s shoulders probably wouldn’t be all that much, and if the driver smoked at home the extra amount added during a car ride would hardly be worth police time.

Smoking might well be what kept the driver calm, especially if he or she had avoided having a drink. Edgy drivers aren’t the safest drivers; it might well be that a fag would be better than a crash.

Katharine Whitehorn is a journalist and founder of International Women’s Forum UK