DECIDED TOPIC: GENDER (IN)EQUALITY IN RELATION TO THE WORKPLACE AND EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS Group members: Shelly Ndlovu , Simon Godobo, Jake Baker, Chol James, Isaac Adebiyi

Introduction Gender inequality within employment relationships has been a major issue in the UK. The main focus of this presentation today will be on one strand of equality which is gender inequality within employment relationships. The major aim is to demonstrate Employee Relations issues, roles played by the state, employers, employees and their trade unions with regards to gender inequality in the workplace and focusing mainly in the UK labour market.

Introduction This could refer to the disadvantages experienced by female employees, in comparison to male employees in the workplace. Evidently, these include employment in low status jobs such as waitressing, the likelihood of being allocated a part-time job which means working less hours in contrast to men, lower levels of rewards, wages or salary and higher concentration of employment at lower occupational levels Rose (2001). In theory the cause of disadvantages at work is the lack of commitment within the labor market, employment relationship and workplace.

Where are women? What are their job descriptions/titles? There is little sign that women are moving into traditionally male occupations. Men utterly dominate industries such as transport and mining. 11% of men work in construction; only 1% of women do. Women are more likely to work in communications, retail and public administration, including education and health. (The Economist, 2011)

Part/full time, temp/fixed contract work

Part/full time, temp/fixed contract work 8.4 million women aged 16 and over worked full-time in November 2015January 2016, while 6.2 million worked part time. Women’s full-time employment declined between 2008 and 2010, but part-time employment of women increased following the economic downturn. Growth in full-time employment has picked up since the end of 2012. (House of Commons Briefing Paper, 2016)

Occupational segregation – what is the extent? Horizontal/vertical? Horizontal segregation – This is where men and women are clustered into different types of work, e.g. different professions Vertical segregation – This is where men and women are clustered into different levels of work, e.g. in a hierarchy within a particular line of work

High Skill vs Low Skill The UK Commission for Employment and Skills (2014) estimates that a greater proportion of women will have degree-level qualifications than men by 2020 (49% of women, 44% of men) Despite women on average having more qualifications, professions that are generally dominated by women are likely to pay less (e.g. nursing vs construction work) (HMRC, 2011)

Social and cultural factors Factors such as the social and cultural backgrounds of particular nations, as well as individuals, have huge impacts on the occupations women go into Ekstrom (1981) suggests that situational characteristics, experiential characteristics, psychological characteristics, societal factors and opportunity factors all play a part in influencing the career paths of women

State involvement and legislation The Equality Act 2010 bans overt discrimination on the grounds of gender among other things (religion, sexual orientation etc.), however there are still discrepancies in pay One such example of how the Equality Act falls short is the ability for employers being able to force their employees to keep their pay rates confidential outside of the workplace, making union involvement in such cases difficult

Trade union involvement –(TUC 2016) The Trades Union Congress (TUC) is a national trade union centre, a federation of trade unions in England and Wales, representing the majority of trade unions. It campaigns for women's equality in the workplace and in the wider community. For example, it covers areas such as equal pay, poverty, TUC women’s conference, childcare, part-time work and so on. According to an analysis published on the 14 October 2016, women earn £8,504 a year less than men by the time they reach their 50s. Gender pay gap still exists and its been noted it gets worse in better paid jobs. Analysis by the TUC published on Equal Pay Day also reveals that the gap in annual salaries between top-earning women and top-earning men has hit 54.9% in 2016.

Trade union involvement – (TUC 2016) Each year, Equal Pay Day marks the point at which women working full-time effectively stop earning as they are paid on average 14.2% less an hour than men working full-time. More than 40 years after the Dagenham strikes and the Equal Pay Act, women’s earnings are still considerably lower than men’s – with the “gender pay gap” sitting at 14.2% for full-time workers. This means that women effectively work for free from November 9th (Equal Pay Day) until January. TUC analysis of official statistics reveals that while some progress has been made in securing an increase in the number of women members on company boards, the salary gap for top earners is still very high. Looking at the top 10% of earners, the gap in annual salaries between full-time men and women rises steadily through each percentile, hitting 45.9% for the top 5% of earners, and reaching 54.9% for the top 2%. The top 2% male earners bring in more than £117,352 a year, while women get £75,745, more than £40,000 a year less.

What are Trade Unions doing to end pay discrepancy? According to TUC 2016, In July the Prime Minister pledged to end the gender pay gap within a generation by forcing large companies to publish information about the difference between average male and female earnings. The TUC believes the government must go further: employers should have to publish more detailed information about gender pay differences in their workplace – including the distribution of men and women – alongside action plans to close the pay gap in their workplace. And companies who fail to comply with the law should be fined.

What do individual organisations do? From April 2018, new league tables will be published outlining the extent of pay discrepancies for companies with over 250 employees (BBC, 12/02/2016) This new scheme will compare statistics about wages of around 8,000 companies, and will hopefully instigate some change with regards to pay discrepancy

Will future workplaces finally be equal? Many companies and countries are making strides towards narrowing the gap in men’s and women’s employment. The following video outlines a few examples. https://youtu.be/voYHPa1uLIg

Social momentum of the unacceptability of inequality A study by PricewaterhouseCoopers found that some of the main things that millennials were seeking from their professions was a good work/life balance, as well as strong diversity policies and equal opportunities (2011, p4) However, many of those interviewed by PwC agreed that their companies were not offering equal opportunities for all, demonstrating a shift in the mentality of workers to a more collective mindset