Women's Views on News |
| A mixed week for British cyclists Posted: 03 Oct 2013 04:18 AM PDT
It has been, at best, a mixed week for cycling in Britain. The mood was optimistic when British Cycling chief Brian Cookson replaced the unpopular Pat McQuaid as president of the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) on September 27, but the results from the World Road Championships soon dampened the mood. With Emma Pooley absent while she focuses on completing her PhD, Lizzie Armitstead was the sole medal hope for Great Britain in the women’s road race on September 28. However, the Olympic silver medallist faced a tough field including the formidable defending world champion Marianne Vos. Only three other British riders were in the race, and no specialist climbers, so Armitstead was short on team support as she faced the hilly course and attempted to put a stop to Vos's reign at the top of women's cycling. In the event, Armitstead was unable to keep up with the leaders in the final phase, and finished 19th, five minutes after Vos took her second consecutive rainbow jersey. Then the entire British men's team pulled out of a brutal road race on September 29. The hilly course and bad weather did not suit the strengths of leaders Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome, but the depth of the failure led some to question the attitude of the two Tour de France winners. But while Team GB's road cyclists were suffering through their dismal weekend in Italy, the leading track cyclists were proving their mettle at the British Track Championships at the Manchester velodrome. There were gold medals for Jess Varnish in the 500m time trial, keirin and individual sprint and for Laura Trott in the points race and individual pursuit. But the most impressive result of the week came in the team pursuit. Britain dominated the 3000m team pursuit at the 2012 Olympics, when Trott, Dani King and Joanna Rowsell stormed to gold with a world record. However, the format has changed this year to reflect that of the men's event; now, teams of four riders race over 4000m. Trott, King, Rowsell and new addition Elinor Barker were keen to prove that the change will make no difference to their dominance, taking the British title in a world record time of 4:32:721. Off the track, all four ride for Wiggle Honda, the professional women's road team set up last year with the backing of the Bradley Wiggins foundation. Wiggle Honda has met with significant success on the road in its debut season, and there are hopes that it will advance British women's cycling in the same way that Team Sky boosted the men's sport. Indeed, this is currently the only hope for the development of British women's road racing: there has been no women's academy since 2009, and there is no full time women's coach. Cookson campaigned for the UCI presidency on a platform that included support for developing women's road racing. However, as the Guardian has pointed out, the weak British performance at the World Championships is a direct result of the lack of investment in women's cycling during his time at British Cycling. Let us hope that Cookson can follow through on his campaign pledges and give the sport the support it needs.  |
| How can more women in work be a bad thing? Posted: 03 Oct 2013 01:04 AM PDT
There are more women in work than ever before! This is good news, I hear you cry. You’d have thought so, except some national newspapers have used the latest report on women in the labour market to lament the loss of ‘traditional’ family structures. The report, by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), highlights the fact that the last 40 years have seen women’s employment on the up; around 67 per cent of women aged 16-64 are in work today, compared to 53 per cent in 1971. The conclusion is that women are squeezing men out of jobs, particularly through the rise of the working mum. According to these ONS figures, around three quarters of married mothers are now in employment, or, as some reports (The Telegraph) would have it, they have been ‘forced back into employment’. Aside from a cheap pop at the coalition government’s ‘un’ family-friendly policies, this is just another example of the negative stereotypes applied to working mothers which would never apply to working fathers (who even uses the term ‘working father’ anyway?!) I can’t imagine every one of those 200,000 mothers who went back to work in the last two years were forced to do so against their will, but there remains a perception that childcare is the woman’s role (and desire), in which case returning to work means you are neglecting your duty as a mother and therefore you must be being coerced. If you move beyond the deliberately controversial headlines, the report simply reinforces what we already know; there is still not equality in the workplace. Despite there being more women in work than ever before, men still have consistently higher employment rates than women. Men tend to work in the professional occupations that demand higher salaries whereas women make up most of the workforce in the lower paid caring and leisure professions. Even female graduates are more likely to work in lower-skilled occupations than their male contemporaries. Most telling, however, is that men with children are more likely to work than those without, but the opposite is true for women; despite the ‘scandal’ of countless mothers being forced back to work, the employment rate of women with children remains much lower than those without offspring. These latest statistics simply illustrate the fact that having children and maintaining a career are still not compatible in 2013. Ann Pickering, O2′s HR director, told HR magazine: “[This] report is further evidence of the work still needed to get women better represented at higher levels of businesses. “One striking example I’ve come across is women who, on returning from maternity leave, have been advised not to talk about their children at work. “This kind of archaic attitude has absolutely no place in a modern business. A truly diverse workforce is not just about what’s proper and fair, it is also crucial to business success. “[These] results are a wake-up call for businesses to act to ensure they don’t miss out on the valuable contribution made by women at all levels, whether that’s by providing better flexible working policies, childcare facilities or mentoring programmes to empower the female talent within their organisation.” Separate figures from website Working Mums suggest 40 per cent of women have struggled to get a suitable job in their chosen field after taking a career break to have a child, and almost a fifth had to take a lower position in order to re-enter the workforce. So even if women are returning to the workplace in their droves, they’re still paying the price for motherhood, and until a fair division of parental leave replaces traditional maternity leave, there will always be a gap.  |
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