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Lord Dykes: My Lords, I thank the Government for being so strong on these matters and reminding Israel of its solemn obligations under international law. Will the Government have yet another go at reminding the United States of its equally solemn obligation not to be biased towards Israel but to be neutral with regard to
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Israel and the future Palestinian state and to respect international law by calling on Israel to withdraw to the green line?
Lord Triesman: My Lords, there is consistent discussion in the quartet—I know that the noble Lord will be aware of it—aimed at trying to ensure that we are all aligned with the same policies. In a way, it is a matter of having the right sentiment or frame of mind in dealing between two parties. It is perhaps even more important to ensure that everyone sticks to the formal agreements that are written down—they are clear beyond peradventure—and to which everyone has given their assent. If all parties in the quartet were to do that consistently, we would be likely to see more dynamism in the peace process.
The Lord Bishop of Rochester: My Lords, have any discussions taken place with Hamas on its policy regarding Palestinian Christians? Like many others, I have seen slogans, particularly in Gaza, which say things like "First the Saturday people and then the Sunday people".
Lord Triesman: My Lords, we have strenuously urged on all those in the Palestinian Authority—Fatah prior to Hamas—support for human rights, including the rights of religious practice. We have funded programmes to demonstrate our support for those rights, and we will continue to do that wherever we can have that discussion.
Lord Howell of Guildford: My Lords, following the questions of the noble Lords, Lord Avebury and Lord Dubs, how are the Government going to cope with the rapidly emerging dilemma of the Palestinian Authority desperately needing cash and forming a government who do not even recognise the two-state solution, let alone the borders between Israel and anywhere else? Is there not a need to mobilise other Arab states and Gulf States, all of which are rolling in cash with vast amounts in surplus? Could they not help to finance the Palestinian Authority more effectively? That would ease the dilemma that the Government will have to face.
Lord Triesman: My Lords, it is difficult for me to answer for what other states in the region should do, whether they have a lot of cash or not. Yet we can answer for what we and the EU do. We believe that the authority had made good progress; it warranted full disbursement of sums. The World Bank said so, as a result of its judgments made on progress against all the established benchmarks. As a result, the European Commissioner for External Affairs announced on 27 February that the European Commission would provide €120 million in emergency aid. That is being supplemented in various ways; we are making contributions through NGOs and others to assist the humanitarian effort. If others were to assist that effort, it must be to the benefit of the region. Unfortunately, we do not hold the end of a lever which is cabled at its other end to them.
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Business
11.37 am
Lord Davies of Oldham: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Hunt of Kings Heath will repeat a Statement on occupational pensions following the debate in the name of my noble friend Lady Gould of Potternewton.
Business of the House: Debates Today
The Lord President of the Council (Baroness Amos): My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.
Moved, That the debates on the Motions in the names of the Baroness Gould of Potternewton and the Lord Harrison set down for today shall each be limited to two and a half hours.—(Baroness Amos.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
Women
Baroness Gould of Potternewton rose to call attention to the progress made by women in the United Kingdom and abroad; and to move for Papers.
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, I am delighted to once again be opening a debate to commemorate International Women's Day, albeit a week late. I would like to thank my own party group for giving me the opportunity to do so. Before I move into my speech, which is based mainly on UK events, I want to ask my noble friend Lady Amos, who I am delighted to see will be replying to this debate, whether it is true that UNIFEM is going to be ruled out as an organisation because of UN restructuring. I have been specifically requested to ask that.
Within the past year, we have celebrated the 30th anniversary of the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, alongside the Equal Pay Act 1970. Yet I believe that in order to judge any progress that women have made, it is necessary to put into perspective the lives of women as they were, say, 200 years ago. So I make no apology for a short history lesson. Women's struggle has been one of battling against a man-made society and against male-dominated structures. Men devised and built the framework of government and society that controlled women's lives. Two hundred years ago, women had virtually no rights at all. They were chattels of their fathers and husbands; they were bought and sold in marriage; they could not vote and when they married they could not own property. At no level of society did they have equal rights with men.
The turning point came in 1918 when women got the vote. In the latter half of the 19th century there began to be gradual changes in the role of women. Many factory Acts were passed which placed restrictions on hours and conditions of work and married women won the right to own property. The change of attitude to public welfare coincided with the entry of women into the political establishment. In 1939, during the Second World War, nurseries were built so that
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women could take on men's jobs in factories and on the land. But that sense of freedom was not to last. Post-war, the nurseries were closed down and women were expected to return to the home. But women had realised the importance of economic independence and the number of women going out to work steadily increased. By the late 1970s, there were more than 7 million working women. Fundamental to that independence was the advent of the contraceptive pill and the passage of the Abortion Act 1967. For the first time, women had gained sexual freedom.
There then began a seesaw of advancement and retreat with the introduction of the Equal Pay Act 1970 and the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, and with the establishment of the Equal Opportunities Commission, under the chairmanship of my noble friend Lady Lockwood, there was a feeling of great optimism. The Employment Protection Act 1975 made maternity leave a statutory right. One year later, the first Sexual Offences (Amendment) Act 1976 was passed. It was the beginning of a new dawn. Equality was on its way, but there was a blip. Women found that they were particularly vulnerable in times of recession, the nature of their jobs, their lower skill levels and lack of seniority, and domestic commitments made them more vulnerable to redundancy. In May 1981, the EOC concluded that women had borne a disproportionate share of the increased rate of unemployment. Opportunities for women to continue in full-time paid employment were affected by the reduction in maternity rights under the Employment Act 1980. It was a particularly depressing time after the excitement and expectations of the late 1970s. But a sense of determination and tenaciousness had set in. Women's groups, trade unions and Labour women evolved strategies and made demands for advancement. For the first time, positive action was on the agenda.
The past 10 years have seen many of the demands made by those women in the 1980s come to fruition. There is now a new language of buoyant confidence and most women feel freer. There is a better balance between men and women at work and in the home. But while women today may be living in a kind of utopia which women in the 19th century could only dream about, that freedom is accompanied by continuing inequality. The gender divide has not gone away. It is incredible that the pay gap between women working part time and men working full time is about the same as 30 years ago at just under 40 per cent. The full-time pay gap in 1975 was 29 per cent; now it is 17 per cent. The part time pay gap was 42 per cent and is now 38 per cent. Disgracefully, there has been hardly any movement at all.
There are three main causes for that slow progress towards equal pay—occupational segregation, the effect of caring responsibilities on women's working patterns, and pay discrimination, where pay systems are unfair to women employees. There is a similar picture throughout Europe, where the full-time pay gap is 15 per cent, even though the right to equal pay
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has been enshrined in the original Treaty of Rome since 1957. The European Commission is critical of member states for lack of progress saying:
"Although the pay gender gap is recognised as a serious problem, new concrete targets and actions are rare".
A number of European countries are trying to look deeper into the cause and here in the UK we welcome the report of the Women and Work Commission chaired by my noble friend Lady Prosser and await with interest the response to its 40 recommendations.
One of the consequences of occupational segregation is that there is a clear correlation between those sectors where women are under-represented—women engineers and women working in construction and plumbing—and where there is a skills shortage. About 70 per cent of women with SET qualifications are not working in SET professions. The economic benefits of SET professions in eliminating job segregation and closing the pay gap are obvious. They enable women to reach their full potential, make a significant contribution to ending child poverty and end the cycle of lifetime inequality that results in women's poverty in old age. The Women and Work Commission report estimates that the UK economy would benefit by up to £23 billion if women's participation in the labour market was increased.
The Sex Discrimination Act gave women formal equality, but that formal equality is a thin veneer that all too easily shatters as soon as caring responsibilities come along—caring for a child or for a disabled adult or older relative. Studies have shown that in the 1970s fathers with children under five devoted less than a quarter of an hour per day to child-related activities, but that figure is now two hours per day, which, of course, helps. Nevertheless, women all too easily end up on the money track, restricted to low-paid, part-time work, which is a particular problem for single mothers.
The Work and Families Bill is an important step in giving carers the right to request flexible work, building on the current right for parents with children under six, almost a quarter—22 per cent—of whom have requested to work flexibly since that measure was introduced. We look for that to be further extended to include all workers. There is overwhelming support for more flexible working patterns from both employees and employers, all of whom benefit—400,000 men have taken paternity leave. The evidence shows that eight out of 10 fathers want to spend more time with their children but, at the current rate, cannot afford to do so. We also look to the further increase in paternity pay.
There are 10 million carers in the UK. The indication by the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions that there will be an introduction of weekly credits for women carers is welcome. If ever women were penalised for caring, it is in the way in which they are currently treated by the pension system in retirement. One in five women faces poverty in retirement. Women's income is just 57 per cent of men's and 2.2 million women are not accruing rights to a basic state pension. The pension system was designed for a different era, when men went out to work, had
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jobs for life and wives stayed at home, dependent on the men for their pensions. That is the past. A fragmented working pattern is now the norm and not the exception. Women are badly served by the outdated pension system. The Government's pension credit system has delivered for over 2 million women but, ultimately, equality can be achieved only by a fundamental change to the pension system, about which I am sure we shall hear more from my noble friend Lady Hollis.
Earlier this year the EOC produced its annual review, Sex and Power: who runs Britain? 2006, which shows that, while women have made great strides in the past 30 years, the divide is still stark. At the current rate, it will take another 20 years for women to achieve equality at top levels of the Civil Service. There are only three women at Parliamentary Secretary level, with only 25 per cent of top management posts being occupied by women. There is only one female CEO, only 13 per cent of women directors in the FTSE top 100 companies, leading the EOC to identify that it will take another 40 years to achieve equity with male directors, and 96 out of 100 company directors are men. We should be concerned that it is expected that new female directors on top boards are more likely to come from outside the UK, having had previous board experience and a more varied background.
Historically, the criminal justice system has been a particularly male-dominated part of our legal system and still is. It would take 40 years—another 40 years—to achieve an equal number of senior women in the judiciary. There is only one woman Law Lord in your Lordships' House. We look to the new judicial appointments system and hope that we see a fairer method of appointing judges, resulting in more women and ethnic minority judges, perhaps accompanied by a sentencing policy and practice that responds more appropriately to the needs of women offenders. I could go on—93 out of 100 university professors are men, 95 out of 100 general surgeons are men—but perhaps the most disturbing figure of all is that it has taken 88 years to reach the figure of 126 women MPs. At that rate of progress it would take 40 more general elections, another 200 years, for there to be an equal number of male and female Members of Parliament. That process, I hope, will be speeded up with the Labour Party continuing its programme of positive action and the main Opposition developing its proposals to get more women candidates standing for its party. Therefore, I am a little disappointed—I say this with regret—that there are no Back-Bench speakers on the Opposition Benches putting forward their proposals for the future advancement of women.
Some might argue that the number of women MPs does not matter. However, greater numbers of women not only makes the other place more representative of society but suggests that their impact cannot be denied. Since the influx of women in 1997, issues such as violence against women, childcare and work-life balance have moved quickly to the top of the political agenda. As well as those achievements, credit must also go to the Labour Government for many other
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positive changes, including generous maternity pay of £106 a week, increased maternity leave, paid paternity leave, the right to request flexible working, the national minimum wage, the national child strategy and, importantly, as I repeat, tackling violence against women. All those are measures designed to promote equality for women.
The working tax credit has enabled half a million mothers to choose to stay at home with their children for longer, and we will soon see a new duty on public bodies to promote sex equality—perhaps the biggest step forward for sex equality in 30 years. It is bold, forward-looking legislation, in which responsibility lies firmly with the organisation and not the individual.
Those are real achievements, but there is still more to do. We need to continue to put support for parents and carers at the heart of our agenda. We have to establish a fairer system of pensions. We have to change the culture in the workplace by creating more high-quality, high-paid, flexible and part-time work. To address the inequalities that still exist 30 years after the introduction of the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, we should ensure positive action in political parties and the workplace. We need to explore the role of the private sector in promoting equality; the duty to promote sex equality should not be limited only to the public sector. That is an issue that the forthcoming Discrimination Law Review should consider, and these are questions to think about as we consider the draft Single Equality Bill, creating a modern legal framework for the 21st century. I believe that that is the challenge ahead.
I close by stressing that establishing equality for women also ensures a greater freedom and equality for men. In the words of Emmiline Pankhurst, we have to free half the human race—the women—so that we can help the other half. I beg to move for Papers.
11.52 am
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