Tories tear up equal pay law

Louise Nousratpour, Equalities Reporter
Thursday December 2, 2010
The Morning Star

The government scrapped legislation today that would put a legal duty on employers to disclose whether they pay women less than men.

Business organisations rejoiced at Equalities Minister Lynne Featherstone's decision not to enact Labour plans to extend mandatory gender pay reporting to private companies with 250-plus employees.

Employers will be left to police themselves about whether they are breaking equal pay law - despite clear evidence that the voluntary approach has failed.

Ms Featherstone also confirmed the government's intention to scrap the socio-economic clause, which would have put legal duties on public authorities to reduce inequality by taking into account disadvantage and poverty when making decisions about policies.

Publishing the government's equality strategy today, she said: "We want to move away from the arrogant notion that government knows best."

Under the now scrapped section 78 of the Equality Act 2010, employers had been given until April 2013 to make voluntary arrangements work or face mandatory pay audits.

But the coalition government has now kicked equal pay further into the long grass by giving no deadlines to bring rogue employers in line.

Adam Marshall of bosses' club the British Chambers of Commerce hailed the government for removing "the burden of compulsory gender pay reporting."

Fellow fat cat Miles Templeman of the Institute of Directors even blamed women for pay discrimination, claiming: "Hard evidence shows that influences and choices made by women at the pre-employment stage are what generally lead to average gender pay differences."

Public-sector union Unison general secretary Dave Prentis slammed the decision to abandon legal pay audits as yet more evidence that this government is no friend of women.

"Women public-sector workers face a triple whammy - frozen pay, cuts to services and now further delays in giving them equal pay," he said.

"It is a disgrace that women are still getting paid less than men. This move threatens to turn the clocks back on all the progress already made with equal pay."

A landmark study today put Britain in the bottom four of the OECD countries in terms of equal parenting, the gender pay gap and other equality issues.

The Fatherhood Institute highlighted that women were still paid on average 21 less than men in Britain compared with 9.3 per cent in Belgium.

TUC general secretary Brendan Barber said: "The decision not to introduce mandatory gender pay reporting, despite the failure of the voluntary approach, will allow employers to continue to obscure sex discrimination in pay systems."

But he welcomed government plans to introduce positive action measures and extend the right to request flexible working to everyone, not just parents and carers.

"Allowing employers to choose a woman over a man of equal merit when recruiting will help to overcome the ingrained sexism still rife in some workplaces," Mr Barber said.

louise@peoples-press.com

Britain failing on equality

Louise Nousratpour, Equalities Reporter
Thursday December 2, 2010
The Morning Star

Britain is the fourth-worst country when it comes to parenting leave, the gender pay gap and other equality issues, according to a new study released today by the Fatherhood Institute.

Sweden and Finland shared the first spot of the 21-nation family friendly league table, with only Switzerland, Austria and Japan faring worse than Britain.

Men in Sweden can get up to 40 weeks full-time paid paternity leave. In Britain paternity leave is two weeks at a maximum weekly rate of £124.88. The institute said this was the same as getting two days leave on full pay.

The Fairness in Families Index - the first of its kind - also found that there was a 21 per cent gap between the average earnings of men and women in Britain, compared with 9.3 per cent in table-topping Belgium.

Fatherhood Institute chief executive Rob Williams said families in Britain were getting a raw deal on paid parenting leave, time spent caring for children and equal pay.

Mr Williams said: "Parents' choices are restricted by an outdated distinction between fathers as breadwinners and mothers as home-makers.

"We need to establish a better framework in the UK to support equal earning and caring. Much more needs to be done to make families fairer and getting the paternity leave system right is a good place to start."

Unison general secretary Dave Prentis warned that things would get worse under the Con-Dems' plans to cut child benefit and water down equality laws, including proposals to abandon legislation designed to close the gender pay gap.

"The government fails the fairness test and is stripping down its commitment to equality," he said.

"We need more support and choice for working parents, with workplaces that understand that families share parenting and that many women are the breadwinners."

TUC general secretary Brendan Barber said it was "disappointing" to see that workplaces were still failing families.

"Evidence shows that close parental involvement benefits a child's development but we need a far more father-friendly working culture, with more shared leave and flexible working, to make this possible for dads today," he said.

"The UK cannot afford to lag behind our Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development competitors on such an important issue."

louise@peoples-press.com

Funds cut for family planning

Louise Nousratpour, Equalities Reporter
Wednesday November 24, 2010
The Morning Star

CAMPAIGNERS warned yesterday that the government's failure to ring-fence funding for teenage pregnancy services will reverse the success of recent years which has seen a downward trend in under-age conceptions.

Latest figures show that teenage pregnancy in England and Wales has dropped to its lowest level for more than a decade, with the number of pregnant under-16s reduced by 7.5 per cent year-on-year from 8,200 to 7,586.

Family planning campaigners hailed the figures - released by the Office for National Statistics on Tuesday - as evidence that the previous Labour government's teenage pregnancy strategy was working.

But Con-Dem ministers have decided not to renew funding for the strategy once its 10-year period expires next month.

The teenage pregnancy independent advisory group (TPIAG), which monitors local authorities' progress in addressing the issue, will also be abolished in December.

Instead councils will be given an early intervention grant made up of funds formerly allocated for tackling issues affecting children and young people.

A spokeswoman for the Department of Education insisted today that this would give councils "freedom" to spend the money as they see fit.

But TPIAG director chairwoman Gill Frances warned that councils facing budget cuts were already preparing to axe teenage pregnancy services.

She added that if councils "take their eye off the ball their teenage pregnancy rates will go up."

Family Planning Association director Natika Halil said a continued financial commitment by the government to the work of the teenage pregnancy strategy was "essential if we're to keep the numbers on a downward trend."

Despite the latest fall in teenage pregancies, Britain still has one of the highest rates in Europe.