British Labour Movement
Takes Up Women's Demands by Judith ARKWRIGHT
'If God had meant there to be equal rights to work then he would not have created men and women.' So said Patrick Jenkin while he was Minister for Social Services in the present Tory Government in Britain.
The first woman Prime Minister in Britain is presiding over a government whose policies are forcing women back into the home and removing many of their hard-won gains. Margaret Thatcher herself promotes this concern for 'strengthening the family; expressing concern about "latch key children'-those who come home from school and have to let themselves into the house-and stating that women have to be at home to look after the old, the sick, and children.
This anti-woman campaign is not simply ideological. It fits in absolutely with the economic policy of the government. The cutbacks in social services mean that women have to take over the functions of the welfare state. Unemployment stands at over 3 million, and women are losing jobs twice the rate of men. Because women in their, often part-time, jobs are considered to be only working for 'pin-money' they are treated as expendable, as a reserve army of
Tory policies towards women are so vicious that even their friends in the Common Market are critical. Together with Belgium and Italy, Britain is currently betaken to the European Court of Human Rights for violation of the Treaty of Rome with respect to the equal pay and social security provisions.
On the equal pay question. Despite the Equal Pay Act of 1970, which became fully operational in 1975, in April 1981 average weekly earnings for women were only 60 per cent of men's earnings. This is a lower rate than in 1975. But it is hardly surprising when you consider that under British law a successful application for equal pay must prove that a women is doing 'the same or broadly similar work to a man'. Most women do not work in jobs that could be compared to a man's; and courts have been ruling against the principle of equal pay for work of equal
Norman Tebbit, the Minister for charges. But the facts speak otherwise. During the five-year period between the passing of the Equal Pay Act and its implementation employers were able to manoeuvre in order to regrade women so that their work would not be comparable to a man's. Jobs have been designated
'men's work' and 'women's work', bring ing about a situation of virtual jobs apartheid in Britain.
Over 40 per cent of women workers work part time. Part-time workers are not entitled to pro rata payment, that is, the same hourly rate as full-time workers. This has been another factor in the failure of the Equal Pay legislation. In April 1980 average hourly earnings timers were £1.67, compared to £2.87 per hour for full-time workers.
It is widely recognised in the labour movement that the Equal Pay and Sex Discrimination Acts have failed. Why? Job segregation and women's role as a reserve army of cheap labour are the main
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Women workers in Britain (DR) answers to this question. Although women make up 42 percent of the work force they are only found in one-quarter of the occupations. cisely the jobs which are going to the wall first-in the public sector, in small non-union firms etc. unions think that women's jobs are more expendable and women are more flexible example of this approach was the Hoover factory in Merthyr Tydfil, South Wales. The management demanded three hundred redundancies-mostly workforce where women are concen-
The union agreed. The women themselves did not and claimed this was a case and in the end no redundancies were
This shows that if women can be as a reserve pool of labour the bosses' job is a lot easier. But if women stand up and fight this can be to the ad-
Indeed, this example also shows the changing mood of women in the labour
They will no longer accept so readily these moves to shunt them in and out of jobs. Despite the shortcomings of the equality legislation they have come to expect equal rights.
In the last year there have been three factory occupations in Scotland led by women workers fighting for their jobs. The case of the women workers at Le Jeans became internationally known because of the tenacity and determination of these workers. Many were themselves the breadwinners for their families, and the vast majority were 21 years old or younger. To such women the very idea that women only work for 'pin-money' or that they do not have the same right to a job as men is a joke. Their fight was an example to the whole labour movement, women and men.
The rise of the women's movement over the last ten years has brought about big changes in the labour movement in Britain. The demonstration against anti-abortion legislation called by the Trades Union Congress in 1979 was a watershed. All subsequent attempts to attack abortion rights have been thrown back because the labour movement now responds so quickly and automatically attacks. Union of Mineworkers, with very few women members, sent delegates to a recent special TUC conference on women's rights.
Women are joining unions at a faster rate than men, and most unions now have women's committees, special schools for women, and have adopted policies on abortion rights and women's right to work. The Women's Conference of the TUC, and the TUC, have even taken up policies on issues like violence against women and rape.
Next month the Labour Party is holding a national festival for women's rights, which also has trade union sponsorship. It is expected to be a massive event, around 50,000 people are expected to attend. This action contrasts rather strongly with the early days of this century when the newly-formed Labour Party refused to support the campaign for
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votes for women. Now the Labour Party, like the trade unions, is under pressure to do something for women.
Ironically, it was a Labour government which introduced the legislation that is now so strongly criticised. Labour is therefore faced with the prospect of having to provide an alternative to its own previous policy. The growing demand for new and better policies on women within the Labour Party reflects the general developing political discussion within the Party. Women have a lot to gain from linking up with the left in the labour movement and fighting for Wide support exists in the British labour movement for women's abortion rights (DR) women's demands as part of an alternative set of policies. Women's sections in the Labour Party, that used to be simply for organising social activity and fundraising, are now growing in strength and
The principle behind the Sex Discrimination and Equal Pay Acts was the notion of providing equal opportunity. That is, removing barriers which prevent women going into certain jobs or getting
Now the labour movement is talking about 'positive action', or affirmative action as it is known in the USA. This is seen as the next step towards
This policy aims not just to remove the barriers to women's equality but to take positive steps to overcome job segrewomen into traditional areas. This is important because job segregation is now widely refundamental issue in achieving women's equality, and fighting the specific aspects of women's unem-
Such a policy, which the TUC have recently adopted, would mean legally enforceable quotas Thus women would be encouraged to enter jobs like engineering, mining, shippolicy could be a real way forward for women since it begins to challenge the idea that women are a reserve army of labour-and argues that women have the same right to a job as men.
It is these sort of radical policies which are clearly going to be the future of the women's movement in the 1980s and 90s a women's movement which is organised within the labour movement itself-and fights to win the labour move. ment to active opposition to the sort of divisive policies exemplified by this Tory government, and to take up the interest women's equality.
Chilean Strikers Need Help the revival of the Chilean Panal textile factory assumed a particu-
For this reason, concrete international solidarity with these work-
Panal is one of the largest textile factories in Chile and also one of the
The unions in this plant existed for more than 32 years. Over many years of struggle, they won important gains, infunctional and well-equipped headquarters.
Nonetheless, the Panal workers have been subjected to repeated attacks on their standard of living as well as many
In response to this, at the beginning of 1979, the most conscious and militant workers at this factory began a campaign among the rank and file to dump the yellow union leadership imposed by the Pinochet government and to replace it with a democratically elected one.
After several attempts, these militants were successful. workers demanded the departure of the government-imposed union leadership, which then went into crisis. Several of its members resigned, opening up the way for electing a new leadership.
Despite threats and fraud and corruption, the new leadership that was elected has maintained itself. With the support of the overwhelming majority of the workers, it launched building, where the pay is higher and the
According to the military dictatorship's labor laws, after the days of a strike, the bosses can hire scabs to work for the duration of the strike. And after sixty days the workers have to accept the bosses' last offer and go back to work, otherwise they are automatically fired and lose all their rights and seniorfight for with a democratically elected one played a decisive role in opening up the way for other trade-union struggles.
The unity among the ranks and the democratic organizational forms achieved by this union enabled 1,500 workers to stay on strike for 59 days. They were an example for the entire Chilean workers strike also became a national The conflict rapidly went beyond economic demands to challenge the government's labor legislation as a whole and the dictatorship itself. The forms taken by the strike also had this effect. ranks were mobilized on all levels of
Delegations were sent to other factories, to the poor neighborhoods, and other regions of the country.
as a national test by many workers organizations. leadership's conception of mobilizing the masses in the streets and all the work done to win the solidarity of the working class with the strike transformed the Panal union headquarters into a center of of all the oppressed. political activity, not just for organizing the strike but for a series of other activities of national and local importance.
On the sixtieth day of the strike, the workers voted to go back to work in order to avoid the severe repression that would have ensued. However, they went united and with a high morale. Immediately afterward, the factory management demanded and got authorization to close the factory and lay off 1,177 workers. While the factory closed its doors, the union has maintained itself.
Since it is illegal to keep a union functioning for a factory that no longer exists, the Panal workers have organized a mutual aid association to continue the struggle and to organize unions and other
The most immediate problem that faces the Panal workers is the threat that their union headquarters will be confis-
Large debts that piled up during the strike threaten the existence of this headquarters, whose loss would be a major setback for the entire