The rebellion against the leadership at the 100th TUC to support unions who take industrial action over equal pay for women is significant not only for women workers but for the entire labour movement. For, given a militant adherence to the intent of the amendment, the results could have far reaching effects indeed.
There are over eight million women workers, approximately one-third of the total working population, about one-tenth of these are in the public service or in professions where there is no wage discrimination by sex. The cost of "equal pay" at its most conservative estimate has been put at £600 million a year and goes from there up to £1,600 million.
In LABOUR'S VOICE (so charmingly decorated by bunny hostesses) the Broadsheet prepared by Christopher Norwood M.P. shows that Britain is second from the bottom in the industrialised nations in the percentage of female hourly earnings compared with men's. He says "If the Government could afford to put 6-9% on the wage costs of distribution and construction by the Selective Employment Tax, the country can afford a phased rise of about 6[%] in the national wages bill to bring to an end a century of exploitation of women at work." Since when would a rise of about 6[%] "bring to an end a century of exploitation..."? Ye Gods and little bodkins! A phased rise of [illegible] would still only bring the percentage up to [illegible] of the male rate and, assuming everybody else stays the same, well below Sweden's rate of 76%.
RELATIVE HOURLY EARNINGS IN MANUFACTURING - 1965 (Women's earnings expressed as a percentage of men's)
Sweden 76[%] ; Norway [illegible] ; West Germany 66% ; Finland 65% ; Belgium 67% ; Great Britain [illegible] ; Japan 52%
AVERAGE HOURLY EARNINGS - October, 1967 (Classification / Men / Women)
Food, Drink and Tobacco 8/9 5/3 ; Chemicals [9/9] 5/4 ; Engineering and electrical 9/6 5/9 ; Shipbuilding 9/8 5/4 ; Vehicles 11/3 6/5 ; Clothing and Footwear [illegible] ; All manufacturing [illegible]
A TOTAL PROGRAMME REQUIRED
More than 4 million women at work get less than 5/- an hour and one in 25 get over 10/- per hour. It's not only a matter of women getting less pay for doing the equivalent jobs to men, it's the lack of training facilities, of apprenticeships, of social prejudices which contribute to the low wage rates for women. According to John Raven, writing in the TELEGRAPH 3/8/68, "British women have fewer opportunities for training, less acceptance in top job[s] and a tendency to "be given unskilled and poorly paid occupations...At a recent count there were only 8,000 female apprentices compared with over 300,000 males; and in many industries apprenticeship is the only door to advancement. There were 110 female [illegible] and electrical [illegible] compared by 90,000 males. [illegible] the subjects studied in this field, examination results from "O" level to degree class list[s] show that women are at least as able as men. Further[more they] have a marked advantage in manual dexterity which must be increasingly important as designs become more complex and compact..."
[illegible] central, other [illegible] demands must [illegible].
INDUSTRIAL ACTION NECESSARY
The big problem with even this proposal is that the Government with its wages and incomes policy of a permitted 3% increase in wages per year - which must, in addition be related to productivity, relatively high unemployment; continuing deficits in overseas trade; and its loyalty to private capital is simply not going to grant any concessions in this matter unless a tremendously militant mass movement forces it to.
A number of unions have now put themselves out in front of this fight. The amendment urging industrial action was moved by Miss Joan O'Connell, DATA, who said "only 10 per cent of women working in Britain received the same salaries as the men they worked with. This position would not change until the women at Fords were joined by others up and down the country and were supported by male workers...Employers who counted their profits in millions were watching the debate to see whether their licences to profiteer on the pathetically low wages of women would be renewed."
Mrs. [illegible] Hunt, ASTMS, supported the amendment, "We are not going to sit back and wait for legislation. My association has declared its intention of taking industrial action in suitable cases to secure equal pay for women members."
The projected conference on equal pay scheduled for Oct. 22 in London should come forward with useful ideas for deepening the movement. But if the struggle gets back on the parliamentary trail we can expect to wait for our emancipation until [the] 200th anniversary of the TUC.