Yugoslavia On the path of a hard battle Women's day The past struggle for equality Women's day The future

by Brenda Lee

IN May 1997 working class people throughout Britain celebrated Labour's
victory, or to be more precise, getting the Tories out. No one expected
miracles. The ravages of 18 years of Tory rule would take time to repair.

But with the election of many more women MP's we could be forgiven for
hoping that a working woman's lot would become a happier one. Even those of
us with no illusions about Tony Blair and his Millbank mandarins felt
things would indeed only get better.

Three years on and the government leaders are still trying to bask in the
euphoria of those first few days and to convince us that everything is
rosy. But reality has a habit of hitting you in the face.

It's 25 years since the Equal Pay Act became law and yet full-time women
workers earn an average 20 per cent less than men, while the rate for
part-time women workers is even less -- that is, 42 per cent less.

Still worse, the 1999 New Earnings Survey showed that for the first time m
10 years the pay gap between men and women had actually widened, reflecting
the widening gap between public service and manufacturing pay rises.

A recent study by the London School of Economics has shown that, on
average, a woman will earn £250,000 less over her lifetime than a man with
a similar level of skills. Whilst time out for rearing children plays a
part, the biggest contributing factor is that women are concentrated in the
lower band areas of employment. Work pre-dominantly done by women is still
very much under valued.

Many sectors of the economy where women are a significant part of the
workforce are now under attack, for example, in our public services.

On Ist April "Best Value" comes into force in local government
departments. This is a thinly disguised version of the Tories' compulsory
competitive tendering, which will lead to a deterioration in pay and
conditions for council workers and possibly major job losses unless a big
offensive is launched by public sector unions.

The decision by Marks & Spencer to cut orders to William Baird and Daks
Simpson clothing manufacturers has put the jobs of 6,000 clothing workers
in jeopardy. M&S say they had little alternative due to a drastic drop in
their profits last year.

But research conducted on behalf of the GMB general union who represent
the clothing workers, shows that their "mere" seven per cent profit on
sales compares very favourably with competition at home and abroad, making
a pre-tax profit of £548 million. The real reason behind the move was City
greed.

The orders taken from these two British firms are instead to be placed in
the developing world where clothing workers get a fraction of the pay of
their British counterparts.

M&S shareholders hope to pocket the difference but they may be in for a
rude awakening. Loyal M&S customers are generally prepared to pay their
high prices for British made clothes. So this could end up being a false
economy for the bosses and, worse still, lead to further cuts in jobs in
both garment manufacturing and in shopwork.

Shopworkers union USDAW are also concerned about the takeover of Asda by
the US retail giant Wal-Mart, who run the US chain and others abroad with a
high percentage of casual and temporary staff.

An area of work where women can earn relatively good pay is in banking and
insurance. Here again, future prospects are uncertain. Thousands of jobs
were lost last year with the merger of Lloyds Bank and the TSB, and 4,000
are to go in the merger of Norwich Union and CGU. One merger which has been
positive for workers in this sector is that of the two former unions BIFU
and Unifi to form UNIFI. This can only serve to strengthen the fightback.

New technology which could be used to free workers from drudgery is, in
the hands of the capitalist class, being used to create modern day
sweatshops known as Call Centres.

Workers are stuck for hours on end in front of a computer terminal, under
great pressure to handle a maximum number of calls in a minimum amount of
time. Your PC can even be used to monitor the time you take to go to the
loo! Staff are caught in a dilemma of wanting to assist callers with
difficult problems but needing to fulfil a target. This can lead to great
stress.

But the bosses aren't having it all their own way. A one-day strike in
November by 4,000 members of the Communication Workers Union (CWU) at BT
Call Centres has led to an increase of 800 full-time jobs, a reduction in
the use of agency staff, improved annual leave arrangements and team
targets for call handling, rather than individual ones. The CWU are now
targeting Call Centres belonging to other companies for recruitment.

Women make up 75 per cent of the workforce in the NHS. The serious
underfunding of the service, despite Labour re-assurances to the contrary,
was clear from its near collapse under the strain of the flu epidemic
earlier this year.

The flu crisis is over, yet still thousands of operations are being
cancelled, sometimes on the day they are due to take place. That causes
great distress to patients who may have "psyched" themselves up for surgery
that they were nervous about undergoing.

This is stressful for staff who have to present such patients with the
disappointment, increasing the length of pain and suffering for the patient
and the strain on those -- mainly women -- who are caring for them at home.
The delays for some patients tragically result in their condition
deteriorating to a stage where it becomes in-operable.

In the meantime, the government are hell bent on pursuing PFI as the
method of financing the building of new hospitals. It is presented as the
private assisting the public sector. In reality, fat cat developers are
poised to reap substantial profit out of the service -- money which
otherwise would go on patient care.

There is evidence that in some hospital trusts volunteers who used to
provide the little extras that made a stay in hospital more pleasant, are
now actually doing some jobs formerly done by paid workers -- low paid
women being replaced by those who are unpaid.

Education is another area of public service being menaced by
privatisation, with several Local Education Authorities -- typically those
in deprived areas -- already being sold off to the private sector. For
profits to be extracted in areas where there has been serious underfunding
for years, we can expect a greater exploitation of staff and worsening
services for our children.

Another issue which is affecting low paid workers in education is the
recent social security commissions' decision to deny term-time only staff
the right to claim Job Seekers' Allowance for the weeks they are not under
contract to their school or college.

The excuse that has been given for this decision is that this is "a
pattern of work accepted by the employees". Whilst it is true that there
are some women who seek term-time only work to fit in with child care, many
others employed in these jobs would like a 52 week contract, but have had
to take what's on offer. Unions representing these staff are pursuing this
issue through the European Court.

The 'Fairness at Work' legislation brought in by the government has had
some positive effects. For example, the lowering of the qualifying period
to claim unfair dismissal from two years to one. This particularly helps
women who need to change employment more often than men due to childbirth
and childcare. But the positive impact of this legislation does not
counteract the detrimental effects of the Tory anti-trade union laws which
are still in place.

Over the last three years women have played a prominent role in a number
of major disputes, such as Magnet kitchens, Critchley labels, Hillingdon
hospital and the current Skychefs dispute. And, of course, who could forget
the magnificent efforts of the "Women of the Waterfront". They travelled
far and wide speaking on behalf of the community of sacked Liverpool dockers.

There was a lot of public sympathy for these disputes and regular
financial donations. But what would have brought them to a quick and
successful conclusion was the kind of solidarity action denied them by
legislation.

Renewed pressure must be brought to bear upon Labour to repeal these laws
or we must be prepared to make them ineffective by collective defiance.

The government have brought in a number of measures under their "Welfare
to Work" scheme designed to get people off benefit and into jobs. In
October, for instance, the Working Families' Tax Credit (WFTC) was
introduced to give families with at least one working parent a minimum
income of £200 per week (not exactly a fortune).

Unfortunately, what is given with one hand is taken away with the other.
Increases due to WFTC can be lost from Housing Benefit. Undeniably, there
will be some working class families who gain from WFfC. But the biggest
beneficiaries will be skinflint employers who can continue to get away with
poverty pay in the knowledge that it will be topped up by taxpayers' money.
Yet again, that amounts to a re-distribution of wealth amongst the working
class and not from rich to poor.

A much more effective re-distribution of wealth could be achieved by a
policy of progressive taxation which would collect revenue from those who
could most afford to pay.

Then there is the "New Deal" -- yet another in a long line of measures
brought in over the years to take people temporarily off the unemployment
register under the guise of training. This scheme is not much better than
the old Youth Opportunities Scheme (YOPS), the so-called Community
Programmes, and other such schemes of the past which have offered even less
to young women than they have to young men. The scheme might more
accurately be called "Raw Deal".

In the Financial Times recently, Oxford economists Esra Erdem and Andrew
Glyn explained that such efforts to get people off benefits can't succeed
in areas where there is simply no work. Merseyside, for instance, needs an
extra 134,000 jobs to bring the region up to the same level of employment
as the south of Britain (excluding inner London which is itself an
unemployment black spot).

The Oxford researchers and also recent research at Hallum University in
Sheffield, show the government unemployment statistics to be extremely
misleading. In many areas where traditional industries have been destroyed,
men not classed as employed are nonetheless "economically inactive", in
other words not working.

Many are on Incapacity Benefit either through stress caused by the
inability to find work, or because they have been left with health problems
due to poor health and safety in their previous jobs. These men would work
if suitable jobs became available -- counting them would add another 2.9
million to the true figures for the jobless. According to research, the
figures are worse still: women in areas of scant employment don't even
enter the labour market so they don't appear in any statistics.

One year on and the National Minimum Wage has been reviewed to give a rise
of a paltry 10p per hour. This comes second only to the 75p per week rise
to pensioners as an insult to our class. As Mum used to say when we got our
pocket money: "Don't spend it all in the one shop!"

Pensions is another area where women lose out due to missed contributions
or not having paid any National Insurance at all due to part time and
casual work. Women make up a large percentage of our older pensioners and
many are living in abject poverty.

The £100 fuel payment paid to pensioners is welcome, but they wouldn't
need it if pensions were related to average earnings.

There have been recent improvements in statutory maternity rights and yet
many pregnant women are still unfairly dismissed or suffer other forms of
discrimination at work. And once you've had your baby, childcare is the
major headache.

Legislation has provided parents with up to three months leave for caring
responsibilities, but this is unpaid so it is a concession that most
working parents won't be able to afford to take up.

We are told there is no money for free nurseries, school repairs, hospital
beds, better public service pay, and so on, yet no expense was spared on
bombing Yugoslavia which ran into millions of pounds per day.

We started this article reflecting on the last General Election. Next
year, we will be due for another. Despite all the criticisms of Labour,
voting for any other party is not an option for our class. Instead, we need
to use the next 12 months to exert real pressure on the Labour leadership to:

Stop further privatisations and start a programme of taking privatised
utilities back into Public ownership;

to implement a progressive taxation policy;

to repeal anti-trade union legislation;

to pursue a truly ethical foreign policy;

to cancel Trident and start a programme of arms diversification;

to use the money released to fund a proper state welfare system.

Putting mass pressure on Labour will lead to improvements in our quality
of life under capitalism, and to build a truly just and equitable society
for all working class people, we need to struggle to build socialism.

Whenever socialism has been built and where it is still being defended and
developed today, women have made and are making a vital contribution. For
example, our sisters in Cuba, who celebrate the 40th anniversary of the
founding of their Federation this August, are as active now defending the
gains of the Revolution against the US blockade as they ever were.

We need to show our solidarity with them and other women around the world
struggling against imperialism, as they are against terrible hardships in
Iraq.

Most of all we need to take up the struggle here to build a new society
for ourselves. If you are committed to building a socialist future for
Britain please think about joining the ranks of the NCP.