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Completing the Revolution: the challenges trade unions face in tackling sex inequalities

l-r Gail Cartmail, Jenny Watson, Sue Ferns and Ged Nichols

Unions 21 launched the latest in its Debate series at TUC Congress 2007. Jenny Watson, Chair of the Equal Opportunities Commission, introduced her paper on how unions can tackle sex inequalities. Responses came from Unite's Assistant General Secretary Gail Cartmail and Ged Nichols, General Secretary of Accord. The meeting and publication were kindly supported by Thompsons Solicitors.

Jenny Watson opened by saying how proud the EOC is of the work it has done with unions for over thirty years. She praised the group of campaigning women workers at Ford that fought for equal pay in 1969. "The Equal Pay Act may never have been introduced without their action." These women made the car seat covers but only earned 92% of the pay of the unskilled men who swept the floors. Their industrial action, when the company failed to take their claim seriously, meant that no car coming off the line could be sold - thus demonstrating the value of their work.

Jenny outlined the difficult journey that had been taken since then and indicated some of the challenges on the road ahead. Unions had made the transition from being focused on the working man and his 'family wage' to its current situation where is now a higher proportion of female than male union members. As more women enter the workforce it is crucial to trade union growth that unions reach out to those women. This will mean organising in notoriously difficult sectors with low trade union membership such as the hotel and catering trade, which employs a huge number of women.

But Jenny was quick to highlight that recruitment is not enough. Unions need to respond to the issues raised by the current social revolution. This revolution means that more women are in work, more men are actively involved in bringing up their children and more and more people are having to care for elderly relatives. These concerns about work-life balance are compounded by the pressures of technology and globalisation and are "putting our time at a premium."

Gail Cartmail highlighted some of the remaining barriers. Affordable childcare is still a long way from being a reality and means that many women can be trapped on the 'mummy track'. She echoed Jenny's comments about the impact that increasing demands on both men and women of caring for elderly relatives will have on sex equality. As the officer with responsibility for public services in Unite- Amicus, Gail knows only too well the effects of reductions in public sector support for caring. The increased costs of caring impact on women and are increasingly impacting on men too.

Gail also talked about the internal challenges for trade unions and how the fact that the front row of the platform at the TUC looks like "the casting couch of Reservoir Dogs" shows that there is much more work to be done.

Ged Nichols brought a unique viewpoint to the discussion as a male general secretary of an overwhelmingly female union. He talked about what Accord had done to tackle unequal pay within HBOS. An equal pay audit has already been carried out but he recognised that there needed to be far greater action in the private sector on issues such as equal pay: "it's not just about policy it's about enforcement." Ged argued that equal pay is a systemic rather than an individual problem and in his opinion collective bargaining is the best way to deal with systemic issues.

Debate

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