Politics and Periods! no more taboo. in 10 Downing Street.

Our founder Chloe, visited 10 Downing Street to meet with Daniel Korski, Special Advisor for Business to the Prime Minister David Cameron. Here, she recounts the visit and its importance.

“Imagine waking up on a cold late December morning, rolling over in bed to check your emails on your phone at the start of the day and seeing one entitled “IN COMPLETE CONFIDENCE AND PRESS EMBARGO”. What a shock! An invite to the most important house in the UK, would I like to come? Ofcourse I would, no hesitation!
Then I started to wonder – politics and periods – do they mix?

What might people think if I start fraternising with the enemy to sanitary tax? Hundreds of questions started spinning around my head. Along with so many people in their 20s I am disillusioned with the current political landscape in the UK. That doesn’t mean I don’t care about politics. I was so pleased to see the number of female MPs rise in the 2015 election by 6% to 29% in total, I adamantly rebuke anyone who doesn’t exercise their right to vote that so many fought for and I feel passionate about so many different political issues: homelessness, refugees, women’s rights. My work is about behaviour change which can’t happen without politics. This was a chance to see politics first hand and to have a (very small) voice.
Over the Christmas holiday period, I tried to put the idea to the back of my mind. Anyone who knows me well will tell you that keeping secrets is definitely not one of my strong points and I amazed myself by keeping it under wraps.

We headed to London as a team of 20 representatives selected from the South West Region to discuss how the Government has helped our small to medium businesses and what suggestions we had for future schemes and ideas. I had been selected to represent start-ups and social enterprise and was so pleased to get the opportunity to be there alongside some amazing business men and women.

The team was a real cross-section of all types of businesses and the highlight of the day was getting to find out about their stories and experiences. From a husband and wife team who have been in business together for 12 years at John Williams Heating Services, to incredible franchisers Turtle Tots who have franchised baby swimming classes in 44 regions across the UK, to Office Pantry an early stage business delivering healthy snacks to offices, to Pillow May a different type of accountancy firm set up by working Mums to allow female accountants to balance working life with having a family, to the CEO of the multimillion enterprise Excalibur group, who champions small and medium enterprises, to mention but a few.

After heading through security we got to ring the doorbell outside Number 10. We were let into the entrance hall by a friendly policeman who told us we might just catch a glimpse of David Cameron as his car was outside the door waiting to whisk him off to a press conference. No amount of messing around depositing our phones or hogging the doorway allowed us this glimpse as we were herded upstairs to a meeting room. Inside seems to be the cross between a stately-home (in terms of slightly wonky old stairs with paintings of previous tenants on the wall) and standard offices.

Daniel Korski bounded into the room and started to joke about the risks of “toffee”, the strange cross between tea and coffee that they serve in Downing Street, especially risky after 4pm if you use the milk apparently. He surprised me with his relaxed and friendly manner. He doubly surprised me in that he took a real interest in every single one of our individual businesses, asking questions, slipping in discussions on certain government schemes that the different businesses had taken part in such as Growth Vouchers. The meeting was effortlessly conducted and finished exactly on the hour, skills I can only aspire to have.

When he reached my side of the room he was graciously curious about our products “What exactly is a menstrual cup, if you don’t mind me asking?”. Not sure anyone has ever asked that in 10 Downing Street before. He even brought up the contentious issue of sanitary tax, “But are these reusable products still taxed like other sanitary products?”. “Yes Daniel, unreasonably they are.” He surprised me even more by recommending a documentary on menstrual hygiene in Palestine and saying he thought it was a brilliant cause that he would be looking up.

So thank you Daniel for surprising me and showing me that periods and politics can mix. The next step is bringing about real change by turning this listening into action.