Ford Dagenham equal pay. 50 years on?

[Notdonna]

I’ve just caught the tail end of a tv programme about equal pay from the 1960’s at Ford Dagenham. Those women fought and according to the tv programme helped somewhat by Barbara Castle. It seems a law was passed in 1970 for pay equality. Seriously? So 50 years on and it’s still not equal. What does that legislation mean then!

In theory it is. So if I did 20 hours for job A as well as a man we would get paid the same, but more women do fleble/part time/ Zero hours. So it always looks like we pay less. Didn,t BBC get pulled up on it a few years ago as well?

It's still only in theory in far too many cases. 50 years, and we still can't take it for granted.

There isn't enough pay transparency with many employers. If you do speak up, you risk being seen as a troublemaker, and it can be difficult to win cases.

Yes, the BBC has been involved in recent cases, including Carrie Gracie and Samira Ahmed. Birmingham City Council was another fairly recent one, where bin workers (usually men) were able to get bonuses and so on, which cleaners (mostly women,) weren't eligible for. It was found in favour of the cleaners.

It's not just about doing the same job. If you can show another role is equivalent, (as with bin collectors and cleaners,) that can be used for a case.

Being flexible, part time or on zero hours and so on isn't usually relevant for equal pay (it does contribute to the gender pay gap, though not as much as many employers would like it to to excuse the size of their gaps.) If you do 20 hours on job A, you should be paid the same as you male comparators who do 20 hours on job A. There are factors which can make a difference, such as someone have higher qualifications, among other things. Employers can be very good at finding reasons to justify why you aren't paid as much. Sometimes, it's valid. Often, it's because they can't just say, "because you don't have a penis."

There is a film "Made in Dagenham" about how the women who sewed the seat covers brought the entire Ford motor company to a standstill, first through the grievance process and then by striking for pay as skilled rather than unskilled. They had brushed the women off for years and then suddenly they ran out of cars to sell for want of seat covers.

"What does that legislation mean then!"

It means that pay should not be determined by sex, which applies equally to both sexes.

What is does not mean is "Zero Gender Pay Gap", which might be what you are thinking it means?

There is a right in law to "Equal Pay" and that right needs to be defended. It also needs to be exercised in order for it to be of benefit.

For example, if pay grades are not published and employees do not know how much pay other employees are receiving then inequalities can go unnoticed. Job Evaluation Schemes can be a good thing, in making pay schemes transparent, but they can also be rigged and used by employers to obscure inequalities and defend unfair differences in pay.

If someone believes that their employer is discriminating against them on the basis of their sex, in that their pay is less than a comparator employee of the opposite sex, they have the right to apply to take a case to an Employment Tribunal.

If you belong to a Union then the Union Lawyers will examine the case and will advise whether or not the Union should support the claim. Unions will normally only support claims that have a reasonable chance of success.

www.tuc.org.uk/join-union

Other options are to go it alone, pay for legal support or use a "McKenzie Friend".

www.legalchoices.org.uk/types-of-lawyers/other-lawyers/mckenzie-friends

If the Employment Tribunal agrees that the claimant is suffering a detriment on the basis of their sex then it can order the employer to equalise the pay, with back-dating to the time of the claim.

It is rarely an easy case to make though because the claimant and the comparator are unlikely to have identical contracts of employment (Job Descriptions, Terms & Conditions).

This is a handy summary, with much more detail on the rest of the site:

"On this page you will find a summary of equal pay and its relationship to the gender pay gap."

www.equalpayportal.co.uk/equal-pay/

@TehBewilderness I think that’s what I saw the tail end of.
Thank you @MoleSmokes I was indeed thinking ‘zero gender pay gap’.

My pleasure Notdonna

It is very confusing

OP - The musical is good too. My DD's secondary school did it a couple of years ago - really powerful message for the teenagers.

There is a Musical?? I didn't know that! Fantastic!