DAVID Cameron's commitment to boosting the number of female Tory MPs has been questioned after it emerged that nearly 90% of his General Election candidates in Scotland are men.
No females have been selected in winnable seats for the Scottish Conservatives, sparking calls for gender-based quotas to be introduced.
Cameron became UK Tory leader in 2005 and made transforming his male-dominated parliamentary group a key part of his modernisation agenda.
His party drew up an A list of favoured candidates for the 2010 Westminster election, about half of whom were female.
The A list has now effectively been abandoned, and Cameron last year hinted that he could support all-female shortlists.
About 16% of Tory MPs elected five years ago were women.
However, the gender imbalance appears even starker north of the Border.
Scottish Tory leader Ruth Davidson emailed party members last week to put them on a war footing for the General Election.
She also included the names of all 34 candidates who had been selected to contest seats in May, of which four are female.
Three of these candidates are fighting "no-hoper" seats for the Conservatives.
Michelle Ballantyne was selected in Midlothian, a constituency heavily associated with the former mining industry, where the Tories polled 11.9% in 2010.
In Falkirk, where Alison Harris has been selected, the Conservatives polled 11.2% five years ago.
And although the Conservatives held Edinburgh West until 1997, party sources say candidate Lindsay Paterson has only a slender chance of winning back the seat.
The three key targets - holding Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale and picking up seats in Aberdeenshire and the Borders - are being fought by men.
The last time the Scottish Tories returned a woman to Westminster was when Anna McCurley won Renfrew West and Inverclyde in 1983.
A senior party source said: "It's really disappointing that so far only four women have been selected as candidates. It's also surprising that Ruth Davidson hasn't taken a more proactive approach to assisting the many talented women to come forward."
A Scottish Conservatives spokesman said: "We choose our candidates based on their ability, and don't believe picking people purely because of their gender is a sensible or responsible approach."
A spokesperson for Women 50:50, the campaign for quotas in the Scottish Parliament, councils and public boards, said: "It is highly disappointing to see that Scottish Conservatives have a Westminster candidate list where around 88% are men."
Kezia Dugdale MSP, deputy leader of Scottish Labour, said: "You'd have thought with a female leader in Scotland that women would have a better chance of being selected as candidates for the Scottish Conservatives, but that's clearly not the case."
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