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WOMEN AND THE SOCIAL SECURITY SYSTEM The fundamental role of women in bourgeois society as appendages of men, and in particular their role within the family is reinforced throughout the labyrinth of laws, rules and regulations related to claiming benefit in our so-called welfare state. But it is most evident in the way that the Cohabitation rule has been formulated and ruthlessly The Secretary of State for Social Security recently defended the increase in the number of special investigators employed by the SS in order to "safeguard public funds".
It is interesting in this respect to note that between 1960 and 1969 113,161 people were forced to pay back £152,577,038 to the Exchequer after evading taxes but there were only 1,240 criminal proceedings on these grounds for the same period. While every year around 25,000 people are "investigated" by the SS and 7,000 prosecuted for paltry amounts (it is impossible to get anything that could be called substantial out of the SS).
WOMEN-THE WEAK LINK The point being, of course, that SS policy is part of the overall method by which the working class is being whipped into line by the capitalist state. And women are the weak link at which the SS are striking hardest. Unsupported mothers are harassed from all angles. If the woman is pregnant and unmarried they will bug her to name the father and force maintenance (if she succumbs to their pressure she is then forced to endure unbelievable humiliation in order to prove the paternity "charge"). A mother whose children have reached school age is then pressured to go out to work even though she might be worse off this way with the very low wages that the average woman earns, and so on and then we get the vicious cohabitation rule.
The main weapon used in this battle is ignorance.
The Ss investigators snoop and spy for a short period and then barge into the house, confront the woman with the "evidence" of a man's presence, convince her that this is cohabitation and confiscate her order book. Most women, ignorant of the fact that sleeping with a man has nothing whatsoever to do with cohabitation, flustered by the pressures of bourgeois morality, accept this judgement and are left penniless with children to feed and rent to pay.
NO MORAL JUDGMENT!
It is important that the Claimants Unions and Socialist Woman Groups wherever possible inform women that it is possible to fight this. The question is not one of NEWS ITEM - Discrimination in the E.E.C.
A recent report sponsored by the European Commission examines social and economic discrimination against women in the six countries of the E.E.C. Although the Rome Treaty supports the principle of equal pay for equal, work, it is not respected in any one of these countries. Thus although there are variations in detail from one country to another, throughand in the industries dominated by women, the salaries of skilled female workers are lower than for unskilled jobs in industries where men predominate. morality-that is nobody's business. It must be made clear that the Victorian concept that sex involves an exchange of money is nonsense. CU's around the country have successfully brought many cases to the Appeals Tribunals, In itself this is a very hard thing for many women to do. To stand in front of a court and say, "Yes this man is my lover but he doesn't pay me for it", is not easy for many women. But with support from other women and claimants it will easier.
Needless to say very few unsupported fathers are victims of this type of harassment, yet. * In fact unsupported fathers are entitled to a grant for a housekeeper, even if they are unemployed. Needless to say no woman receives such a grant. It is a ludicrous situation that two single people sharing a flat are 1.15 per week better off than a married couple. A man claims and it is the woman that is always the dependent. The fact is that women are treated within the framework of an assigned role in the nuclear family. The SS is determined to perpetuate the idea that women belong in their homes mothering children, (unless it suits them to send her out as cheap labour), and permanently cast in the role of dependent of some man or other.
The Manchester Claimants Union have produced a very useful Unsupported Mothers Handbook, which is a great help for women alone with children. Some cardinals rules should always be remembered by all claimants:
NEVER FACE THE SS ALONE-JOIN OR FORM A LOCAL CLAIMANTS UNION DO NOT ADMIT THEM TO YOUR HOME WITHOUT AN APPOINTMENT IF THEY CONFISCATE YOUR ORDER BOOK-APPEAL FILE A NEW CLAIM IMMEDIATELY * Editorial Note: A recent news item stated that men receiving supplementary benefit will also come under the "cohabitation" rule. It is interesting to note that gay couples are to be excluded the State obviously does not recognise such relationships! out the E.E.C. at every level women receive less pay than men,