The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology has unveiled a series of initiatives designed to support women and girls at every stage of their careers within the technology industry. Announced on 12 March 2026, the package aims to address the significant underrepresentation of women in the sector, which currently costs the UK economy between £2 billion and £3.5 billion annually.
A central part of the announcement is the new £4 million TechFirst Women’s Programme. This scheme will provide 300 paid work placements within small and medium enterprises (SMEs) across the country. Each placement will last at least six months and include dedicated coaching and interview preparation. The government believes this will help local businesses innovate with artificial intelligence while offering women a clear route into stable tech roles.
The government is also targeting the “CV gap” through a new returnship pilot. This scheme is specifically for skilled software developers who have been out of the workforce for 18 months or more, often due to childcare responsibilities. The pilot will run in collaboration with the Home Office and the Ministry of Justice to help experienced professionals return to senior positions.
For younger generations, the government is partnering with IBM to launch the TechFirst Girls Competition later this year. Following the success of the CyberFirst initiative, this new contest will invite thousands of 12 and 13 year old girls to solve creative challenges using coding and AI. The goal is to encourage more girls to consider technical careers from an early age.
The Women in Tech Taskforce has also opened a Call for Evidence today. The group wants to hear about lived experiences regarding emerging technologies and the biases often found in AI models. Research suggests that recruitment AI can favour male candidates five times more than females, and some health models are twice as likely to miss signs of disease in women.
“Women aren’t being given a fair shot in tech – whether that’s getting into the sector, staying in it, or returning after time away bringing up their families. If we don’t address these issues now, we’ll still be having this conversation in decades’ time and that isn’t good enough. We’re acting through a skills and jobs package to get more women into tech quickly. These aren’t warm words – they’re real jobs, real placements, and real routes back in through a door that has been too hard to open, for too long. But we’re not just fixing today’s problem. Through the Women in Tech Taskforce, I want to make sure women aren’t just entering this sector – they’re shaping it. Co-creating the technologies, the culture, and the future of an industry that for too long has been built without them,” said Secretary of State Liz Kendall.
