Why the cuts suck for women

I am posting in response to Kelly’s post ‘Why the Fawcett Society’s challenge actually discriminates against women further’. KentFeminista aims to create a space that brings together women from a variety of different political perspectives and as such we are not always going to agree. Kelly has spoken about the cuts from her perspective as a respected political activist within the Liberal Democrats and a Feminist. I would like to respond to her as a Marxist Feminist who can find no place for herself within mainstream politics.

It is broadly acknowledged by political and economic commentators that the cuts are going to hit the most vulnerable and the worst off in society, in particular the women from these groups. It is these women who I think we should be standing with as feminists as much as, or perhaps more than, hypothetical, educated, mobile, middle income women who might be made redundant from the public sector as a result of the cuts. The shambolic claim from the tories that ‘we are all in this together’ was made stylishly evident in its irony when the Camerons appeared together to announce the cuts in child benefits with Mrs C wearing a dress that would have cost me 36.8 weeks worth of first child benefits payments.

This fashion faux pas made it evident how little knowledge of or empathy the Camerons and the majority of the coalition have for ‘normal, hard working families’, let alone those who are on lower incomes and are already struggling to make ends meet. The TUC and UNISON have reported that the poorest 10% of households will lose 20.5% of their income as a result of the cuts, whereas the richest will lose only 1.6% of theirs. There is a clear Conservative, ideological drive to this poor-punishing budget and it is to the shame of the Liberal Democrats that they have had any part in supporting it.

The argument that the cuts in public sector employees might be a positive thing because it will flood the private sector job market with women who will demand equal pay and flexible working hours does not ring true for me. When I made a noise about the gap between maternity and paternity rights in my private school and those in the state sector, I was roundly ignored by my employers who dared me to take them to a tribunal rather than recognise the inequality of their provision. I, as an articulate, educated and determined women, backed by the majority of my staffroom colleagues, could do nothing to force a change in their provision and I suspect that this will be the case with many other private sector employers. Rather than some radical change in private sector employment culture, basic labour market economics suggests that a market flooded with ex-public sector workers will lead to the private sector entrenching their position and selecting only workers who will not demand such flexibility and equal opportunity provision. That is, if these mythical employers can be found in the first place...

The argument about the existence of legislation that will help these women in their fight to be granted equal opportunities in terms of work hours and culture as well as pay is also hard for me to accept. The Equal Pay Day campaigners drew our attention to the fact recently that just because women can now demand to find out if they are receiving equivalent pay to their male colleagues, this has not in fact led to a closing of the pay gap; it has made us angrier but the gap is still there. Similarly, women have the right to demand consideration of flexible working arrangements from their employers and their employers have the duty to show they have considered such requests but beyond this there is little pressure on employers to change their employment practices or to make life easier for women who want to contribute to society as a carer as well as a tax payer. Legislation, as it stands, is not strong enough; it is whitewash that is emphatically not fit for purpose.

Beyond the issue of the effect of the cuts on public sector workers, many of whom are women, we must also, as feminists, be concerned about the effect of a budget that privileges cuts to public services over rises in taxation. The great trick of the coalition has been their success in making people forget that the deficit we face is not the fault of overspending on the public sector under the Labour party but a result of their decision to bail out the banks during the credit crunch. Their success here has given them enough grace from the public to convince many of us that reigning in public spending is a moral as well as economic necessity. The Fawcett Society’s report eloquently demonstrates the falsity of this argument of necessity and puts forward some serious alternatives that could prevent the terrible cuts that are already being made.

In contradiction to the view that Kelly’s post puts forward, that the Fawcett society are entrenching backward stereotypes, their report actually demonstrates how it is the coalition budget which aims to restore ‘the ‘breadwinner/dependent female carer’ model of relations rather than an egalitarian ‘dual earner/dual carer model’ and I would encourage readers to digest it in full before they make up their mind on its credibility.

The coalition budget will punish the poor and will punish poor women in particular; as such we should back the Fawcett Society and stand in total opposition to it.

Why the Fawsett Society Challenge Actually Discriminates Against Women Further

The Fawcett Society has launched a major, high press challenge against the government's spending cuts to child benefit and benefit cuts in general.

Controversially, as a feminist, I disagree with this action.

Ultimately, I feel this hinders the gender equality debate, is a poor use of legislation and does not represent a true equality impact assessment of the spending cuts in line with other legislation.

Do the Spending Cuts Disproportionally Discriminate against Women?

Flexible Working and the Public Sector

The Fawcett Society states that "65% of public sector employees are women". It then goes on to illustrate why two thirds of civil servant employees are in fact female. Firstly, it is because the public sector has far more stringent flexible working schemes, equal opportunities governance and care related policies than the private sector.

By campaigning against the spending cuts to the public sector, all the Fawcett Society appears to be achieving, to me, is preserving the public sector as the best equal opportunities employer in the country. This immediately implies that these women would be unlikely to seek employment opportunities outside the public sector because practices are not as adequate.

Therefore, the debate is not about the cuts to the public sector, but in fact about how inadequate private corporations in the UK are at providing equal opportunities in employment for women, caregivers and those who seek flexible working schemes.

By enforcing major budget cuts on the public sector, this would significantly increase job seekers into the market who do not just seek flexible working, but insist upon flexible working. This would force companies into applying more suitable flexible working policies, and seek better ways of functioning with a level playing field of diversity strands.

The Fawcett Society may succeed in their legal challenge, but all this would do with secure a narrow field in which women can work and allow private companies to continue to discriminate against women and diversity strands.

Child Rearing

The Fawcett Society is responding to the sociological issue that women are, in the majority of cases, the main child rearers.

This is not a response to the amount of money these women receive, whether from benefits or employment, but in fact a response to the entrenched notion of discrimination within the family unit that the society has failed to address since the onset of second wave feminism in the 1960s.

Gender discrimination and patriarchy remain truly embedded within society through a variety of means. All the time we allow women to be considered as the "caring, mother figure" stereotype, we persist in the notion that women nest and men build.

Sexual liberation in the 1960s allowed women to have sex with a much lower risk of pregnancy thereby allowing them a far greater choice of partner prior to embracing family life.

However, the barriers still exist post commencing that relationship. Once she selected her partner, she is still expected to undertake certain roles within that relationship. This includes being the one to take leave for nine months to two years when a child enters the relationship. While a leave of absence is reasonable for women that have given birth, the assumptions of "biological destiny", "bonding" and the interdependent relationships indicated within society between mother and child ensure that the woman feels guilty for not taking for maternity leave, feels guilty when she is struggling with a variety of related child rearing issues, feels secondary to her child and is obligated by the sociopolitical landscape to fulfil these roles.

The Fawcett Society challenge to spending cuts perpetuates the concept of the woman of the child rearer, thereby inadvertently preventing the positions of women within society from changing to a more equal stance within the workplace.

The limiting of child benefit may in fact assist to reposition the role of the female as a potential to be an equal or main earner within the family; dependent on meritocracy and not upon negative and perceived social roles.

Legislative Tools

There is an entire range of gender equality legislation now available for use within the UK. But all the time that negative sociopolitical concepts of the roles of women within the home, the workplace, or career style, persists, all challengers are effectively moot.

Legislation from the EU indicates that you cannot discriminate against gender on the basis of goods and services. However, we still see gender stereotyping in marketing, advertising and merchandise as well as in the services surrounding capitalism in the UK.

The legislation should be strategic and proactive, enforcing companies and service providers to take into account equality impact on gender.

However, persistent messages such as "men are from Mars, women are from Venus" in advertising, education, and social media seem to be so entrenched, that no one even considered challenging them.

I recently submitted a complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority with regards to an advert for Dove on the television. This is particularly targeted at men with a voice over detailing how fantastic it was to be male, including lifting the entitlements of the man within society and the role and gender rise masculinity that he should fulfil. I was informed by the Advertising Standard Authority that my complaint was not valid as I was the only person to complain.

What is the point of legislation if it does not exist to combat discrimination in these areas?

Instead, the Fawcett Society are using it as a reactive tool to discrimination. To combat discrimination against women based on these entrenched rules without both advising, consulting and instigating steps to erase such embedded notions from society, is what I consider to be a misuse of the legislation.

I'll go further, saying that it helps perpetuate negative connotations of "feminists" as angry, reactive, aggressive groups that do not put steps in place to rectify mistakes but simply battle against them when the impulse takes them.

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This post originally appeared on www.disconcertediscursives.blogspot.com