Women's Views on News |
- Why do women’s careers stall in their 30s?
- Fighting commercial sexual exploitation
- A major first: Women’s Watch 2012-2013
| Why do women’s careers stall in their 30s? Posted: 26 Nov 2013 07:41 AM PST
The Project's goal is to identify in detail a range of factors preventing women from reaching their professional potential, particularly the 'missing women' in middle management. The name comes from the age range in which the gender pay and progression gap widens considerably. Women of all ages are invited to participate, and help answer some big questions: What is important to women, what are their ambitions and how do they make choices in life? How effective is the current level of support and career development opportunities for women in work? What impact does workplace culture have on your career – what is the atmosphere like in today's workplace? Can you really identify with role models in the workplace? What influences some women to leave their employer or leave the workforce altogether? Led by Opportunity Now, a Business in the Community (BITC) campaign for gender diversity, Project 28-40 was launched on 15 November. The Project 28-40 survey is gathering stories, good and bad, about the workplace, from cultural aspects of the experience to societal attitudes and examples of things that are helpful and working well. The idea is to listen to what women have to say and taking action to change the status quo. Fawcett Society statistics paint a stark picture of the current status of women and power: Men outnumber women four to one in parliament – meaning that 22 per cent of MPs are women – and of the 22 Cabinet Ministers, just four are women. ‘The business world also remains largely run by men, with only 17 per cent of FTSE 100 directorships held by women. In the world of media, only five per cent of all editors are women. In the legal system, just 13.6 per cent of the senior judiciary are women. Helena Morrissey, chair of Opportunity Now, said "Twenty-eight to 40 is a critical age for career development where at the moment women fail to be promoted at the same rate as men – a problem both for women and companies. "This survey, the largest ever undertaken globally, will help us all really understand the reasons behind the current imbalance. "We could just plough on, but I think we must be off-target with some of the things we are doing." The survey is completely anonymous, and open until 15 December, should take about 15 minutes to complete: to fill it in, click here. The results and analysis will be launched during BITC's Responsible Business Week in April 2014. Focus groups will then explore themes that emerge, seeking the reactions of younger women, older women, men and business leaders and the results will be used to inform solutions, via government policy and business practice, that help increase women's success at work. The project is also planning to survey approximately 1,000 men, to use their responses as the control group for the survey. And at the request of Downing Street, the survey will also ask if it would be helpful for schools to offer childcare from 8am to 6pm.  |
| Fighting commercial sexual exploitation Posted: 26 Nov 2013 04:08 AM PST
Survivors of Prostitution-Abuse Calling for Enlightenment (SPACE) is an international group of sex-trade survivors with core membership from Ireland, the US and the UK. They will be talking at different events in different parts of Scotland as part of the 16 Days of Action against violence against women. The speakers will be highlighting the need for support for people who sell sex and for appropriate services for those who wish to leave prostitution. They will also focus on the role of 'punters' and how the demand to buy sex drives the sex industry. SPACE was first formed in Dublin, Ireland, in the spring of 2012 by five Irish women, all of them prostitution survivors. These women have come together to raise the public's awareness of the harms of prostitution and to fight for social change in how we approach, think about and deal with this sexual exploitation by challenging the demand and raising equality between men and women. The women decided to forgo their anonymity for the purpose of speaking out against prostitution in the public arena. Their objectives are: Political recognition of all forms of prostitution as sexually-exploitative human rights violations. Criminalisation of the demand for paid sexual access to human bodies. The implementation of Exit Programmes. Public education programmes to inform society about the global exploitation of the most vulnerable populations. To draw attention to the way women who are racially marginalised are grossly overrepresented in prostitution, and that the majority of men buying them are white. The implementation of 'john schools' and the legal requirement that all persons found engaging in the purchase of sex attend them. Rachel Moran, one of the group’s founding members, said, "We know, though our lived experience, that the vast majority of women in prostitution are impoverished and are in prostitution for exactly that reason; and we also know, through our lived experience, that it is simply a cruelty for any government to introduce legislation that limits the ability of a woman in prostitution to earn a living without simultaneously offering her a way out. "We thus strongly feel that prostitution can only be tackled by a strategy that recognises equally the need to suppress the demand for paid sex while offering women viable alternatives to providing it. "Too often, groups that concern themselves with this issue overlook either one root cause or the other. SPACE is asking governments to suppress demand for prostitution by criminalising it, and equally that governments address the shortage of living-wage opportunities for individuals in the sex trade. "Both these aspects," Moran concluded, "are equally important in the fight against commercial sexual exploitation." Members of SPACE will be speaking at The Trades Hall Glasgow, 85 Glassford Street, Glasgow from 9.00am to 9.45am on 27 November. For further details of their talks, email.  |
| A major first: Women’s Watch 2012-2013 Posted: 26 Nov 2013 01:09 AM PST
Billed as a 'snapshot' of the current situation, and based on legislation and statistical data, the report was published by the European Women's Lobby (EWL) and examines three main topics and the links between them. Viviane Teitelbaum, the EWL's president, said that the report 'is the first of its kind – a genuinely feminist appraisal of the situation on the ground in 30 countries. 'I hope it will help us understand why the work of women's associations, and those who support them in so many different ways, is so crucial.' The three areas examined by the report are: women in decision-making; women's economic independence and care responsibilities; and violence against women and women's sexual and reproductive rights. 'We now have the opportunity to pull out interlinked threads,' said Teitelbaum. 'Policies that affect one area have knock-on effects in others.' What are the headlines? While women are increasingly visible in elected office, 'once we move into different forms of decision making roles (heads of political parties, senior ministries, positions on corporate boards) women disappear.' The change that has already occurred in the gender parity of positions of power is of course welcome. However, having taken decades to get to where we are now, the EWL says, 'we no longer have time to waste.' The United Kingdom is one of 15 countries with zero per cent of female leaders in major political parties. And with debate is continuing in many countries over the appropriateness and usefulness of quotas, the EWL report points out that 'a legal guarantee prevents potential regressions.' Already much debated in the UK, the EWL report emphasises the danger as 'crisis and austerity policies potentially jeopardise decades of progress towards gender equality.' In the UK, 'the number of women working part-time is more than triple that of men (43.3 per cent versus 12.6 per cent).' And nearly 30 per cent of women with care responsibilities in the UK 'who are in part-time work or classified as inactive say this is due to inadequate care services.' So with gender gaps still existing in earnings, working patterns and expectations of care, there is still a long way to go before women's economic independence becomes a reality. Worryingly, the report found that 'violence against women remains invisible because of the lack of data, at European and national level.' It appears that while the topic has been gaining ground in terms of serious media coverage and debate, public administration processes have not been keeping up. In the UK, despite less than half of all domestic violence incidents being reported to the police, the police still receive one domestic violence call every minute. With European parliamentary elections and a newly appointed European Commission coming up in 2014, the European Women's Lobby 'urges decision-makers at all levels to take into account the findings of this Women's Watch report and to use them as a tool for change towards full equality between women and men, in all spheres of life.'  |
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