Concerns over the paucity of women in communal leadership roles were inadvertently raised during the Jewish Leadership Council’s visit to Downing Street this week.

The organisation took a delegation of 12 people to meet Prime Minister David Cameron , with only one woman in the group — Union of Jewish Students president Hannah Brady .

But as members queued to enter No 10 on Wednesday afternoon, four senior male members of the delegation successively approached JC reporter Rosa Doherty to ask if she was Ms Brady, revealing that they could not identify the one woman in their group.

After overhearing his fellow JLC trustees speaking to Ms Doherty, Community Security Trust chairman Gerald Ronson intervened, pointed out her correct identity, and said: “It’s terrible, there are never any women.”

Another visitor at the meeting, referring to the lack of women in the delegation , said: “It has always been like this. It’s how the community is and it will never change.”

The organisation has been criticised in the past for the gender make-up of its annual meeting with the Prime Minister.

Last year’s session featured only one woman — then UJS president Ella Rose — in a group of 10. In 2014 there were two female participants – then Board of Deputies senior vice-president Laura Marks and JW3 chair Debbie Klein.

In a statement after the meeting, a JLC spokesperson said: “The representatives of the JLC who attend the meeting with the Prime Minister are chosen as the most relevant members of the JLC to present on the particular issues we feel it is important to raise.

"Despite the fantastic work of the Commission on Women in Jewish Leadership, women are still under represented within the Jewish communal leadership. The JLC intends to continue its support for this project to ensure women are properly and appropriately represented at leadership level. We hope that this work will result in the gender gap closing within the Jewish community in the future.”