This year, International Women’s Day will be celebrated on Sunday 8 March. This annual event has been observed all over the world since 1911, and it has since become an integral part of the international civil awareness agenda. The event’s objective is to celebrate the value and achievements that women around the world have made in social, political, scientific, and economic areas. International Women’s Day also aims to draw attention to gender equality issues and to dispel the various myths that lead to gender discrimination.
This year, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon has called for institutions and individuals all over the world to give priority to women’s empowerment. The Secretary-General has highlighted the importance of looking not only at the progress made so far, but also at the gaps that exist in the implementation of the Fourth World Conference on Women, which was held in Beijing in 1995.
Among the key areas of concern defined at that conference the following issues were highlighted:
- women and the economy
- women in power and decision-making
- institutional mechanisms for the advancement of women
In this post we take a look at how the UK has fared in the implementation of corporate and institutional strategies that aim to move towards full gender equality in the workplace.
Women in the British economy: Progress and key achievements
On the occasion of the 2015 International Women’s Day, it is important to review how far women’s rights have progressed in the British context. There are several crucial accomplishments that need to be mentioned in this respect. One of them relates to how British women have contributed to the country’s economy over the past few decades.
A 2014 report presented at the House of Lords reveals that UK women have been making important economic contributions by taking up senior job positions and by setting up their own companies. The report states that over 20 per cent of British SMEs are now led by women or have a predominantly female management team.
British women have also joined the workforce en masse, and currently nearly 68 per cent of working age women are in employment. This is the highest figure on record since the Office for National Statistics began collecting data.
Women are especially well represented in industry sectors like:
- health and social work (22.8 per cent of all female employees)
- education (15.9 per cent)
- public sector (33 per cent)
And according to the 2014 Global Gender Gap Index, the UK ranks 26th out of 142 countries in terms of gender equality in the workplace.
Women’s equality in the workplace: The challenges ahead
Evidently, progress has been made in the UK towards achieving female equality in the workplace, but some challenges still lie ahead. For example, there is a lack of balance in the number of women who hold leadership roles across the UK. The Professional Boards Forum has noted that only 20.4 per cent of FTSE 100 company directors are female. Women are also poorly represented in paid political roles, where only 25 per cent of British MPs are female. The gender pay gap remains a poignant issue in the British economy and is a barrier to female empowerment. On average, UK women earn 19.1 per cent less than their male counterparts.
These figures represent an improvement over the previous state of affairs (for example, gender gap pay was set at 26 per cent in 2000), but it is clear that much work remains to be done before full equality is achieved. This year’s International Women’s Day presents UK businesses with the opportunity to reflect on their practices and to strive for full equality in the near future.
Sources:
http://www.un.org/en/events/womensday
http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/beijing/platform
http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/dcp171778_350998.pdf
http://reports.weforum.org/global-gender-gap-report-2014/economies/#economy=GBR
http://www.bbc.com/news/business-30112814
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/international-womens-day-2015-how-far-have-rights-females-progressed-1490319