Nationally, women earn an average of 21% an hour less than men for full- and part-time work. The Fawcett Society's data shows that this figure is 53% in West Somerset, while in Windsor and Maidenhead it is 49% and in South Northamptonshire 43%. The smallest gap is in Sevenoaks, Kent, where the difference is just 1%.
Equal Pay is nothing new for the trade union movement and nothing new for Unison. It was one of the unions’ founding principles and we set out to achieve equal pay by the process of union negotiation. The first deal stuck was in local government in the Single Status agreement, followed by Agenda for Change in the health service.
The differences between the two were stark. A4C as it became known, was a national deal, was applied on the basis of an agreed job evaluation scheme and fully funded by the employers. Single status was a scheme to be applied locally on the basis of a local agreement on job evaluation (though a national scheme was recommended) with no new money in the pot.
Hardly surprising then that one was relatively successful and one was not. The difficulty of achieving equal pay within the existing pay bill is impossible. But that is essentially what local government was asked to do. At the bottom end of the scale the problems were well known. Men at the bottom of the scale were paid higher than women, due to the traditional undervaluing of women’s work, partly due to a historic view of men’s work as that of breadwinners.
The local government job evaluation scheme, based on an objective factor analysis, was bound to rate many of the jobs as equivalent, meaning that women workers were entitled to be paid the same as male equivalents. So authorities had little option but to value the jobs on the same grade. So if the pay bill for those on the lowest grades had a value 0f £x million a year, it had to rise to £x + y. to equality proof the scheme.
But where was the amount Y to come from? That was, and is, the dilemma for local authorities. However the problem was intensified by the demands of equal pay law that women were entitled to be compensated by up to 6 years for the past discrimination that they had suffered. So “y” was not the simple difference between men’s pay and women’s pay but that amount multiplied by 6 for those women who had been employed for that number of years previously.
This is the nub of the problem of equal pay. Either employers reduce men’s’ wages or face considerable bills to increase women’s wages to those of employed men and pay for the past discrimination. To do so however is to increase the pay bill in local government by a considerable amount.
But what does the Fawcett society demand:-
“On Equal we urge the government to make a start by introducing mandatory pay audits. Although this would not in itself stop the problems caused by gender job segregation, where greater numbers of women are concentrated in jobs that pay less well, it would make a big difference. By legally requiring that employers show what they are paying to whom and by requiring them to rectify any gender-based inequalities, the problem can be tackled in all workplaces.
Women suffering pay discrimination must also be given greater access to justice. Allowing women to point to hypothetical male comparators would bring equal pay law into line with other discrimination law. Enabling representative actions would mean women collectively affected by systemic pay discrimination could make a claim together, represented by a trade union or other body. This would make the employment tribunal system more efficient, cost-effective and better able to deliver justice to women.”
No one would disagree that that would be the best legal solution. But Unison is a trade union where in dealing with workplace problems the preffered route remains the route of negotiation. But in the current climate, there is no incentive for local authorities to negotiate, They are being asked to do the impossible, equalise pay on an unchanging budget.
But the consequences are even worse. For many authorities there is a way out of equalizing pay, if the workers no longer work for the local authority. So privatization is the solution, through an efficiency agenda. Real world, real solutions, as the privatizers have it.
Our most liberal newspaper the Guardian may wring its hands over the Leeds binmens dispute (gender noun used deliberately) but the fact is the local authorities know that letting contacts is a way of cutting costs. And the cost cutting is always on the basis of workers terms and conditions, By way of example check research on home care, residential workers, cleaners, bin men and street cleaners…
Equal pay is a vital principle for the basis of equality between men and women. Equal pay in the public sector bluntly means the public services must cost more. Its time to face up to that. But more than that. Its time for a Fair Wages resolution, based not only on a fair rate for the job but agreed training, and terms and conditions, Then “efficiency” cost cutting that cuts public sector jobs could not work.
It is time to stop playing about equal pay. “Sexism in the City” may make headlines, but it is NOT a trade union headline. “Fair and equal pay” should be.