Also on Thursday, Liberal Democrat deputy leader Jo Swinson appeared in a debate in the House of Commons with her 11-week-old son Gabriel. It was the first time ever that an MP had attended a Commons debate with a baby.

Swinson’s decision to take Gabriel into the Commons chamber wasn’t just historically significant. The politician’s status as a new mother was directly relevant to the subject of the debate, which concerned whether the government should introduce a proxy voting system for MPs unable to participate in parliamentary votes.

The MP for East Dunbartonshire experienced the perils of not having a proxy voting system this summer, while she was on maternity leave with Gabriel. She had been promised that Tory MP Brandon Lewis would abstain from a Brexit vote that she could not attend, but Lewis broke this agreement and voted anyway. As a result, the vote was directly affected by Swinson having recently given birth.

Speaking in the Commons, Swinson said she was told on Twitter that “she should decide whether she wants to be a mother or an MP”, while one of her fellow MPs questioned why she “couldn’t spend five hours voting in parliament in the evening with a two-week old baby”.

Read more about why proxy voting is a feminist issue here.

Women Making Waves is part of Stylist’s Visible Women campaign to raise awareness of women who’ve made a difference to society. See more Visible Women stories here.

From stuntwomen to equal pay strikers: the women making waves this week