Blog
Fairer Scotland: Employment Support Focus Group
11.00 - 14.00, Wednesday 28 October 2015
Central Edinburgh Methodist Church, Edinburgh
In partnership with Engender, we are holding a discussion session for women who have used employment support services.
The Scottish Government will soon have new powers over employment support and so there is an opportunity to make our voices heard.
We want to hear your experiences; what you think doesn’t work and what you think would better enable you to enter work which is right for you and your circumstances.
The Scottish Government is also running a national conversation on Creating a Fairer Scotland and this session will feed into that process.
The event is free to attend, and all women who have used employment support services are welcome. Arrive from 10.45 for tea and coffee, and will finish with lunch at 1.30pm.
The venue is accessible, we can provide travel costs and an interpreter if needed, and support for childcare costs is available. Please let us know your needs when you book.
Women still more likely than men to earn less than the living wage
Last week the Office of National Statistics released data on the number of people earning less than the living wage in the UK using the 2014 ASHE findings. The living wage is an hourly rate that is independently calculated to reflect the basic cost of living in the UK. The figures showed that almost a fifth of Scotland’s workforce (19 per cent) are paid less than the living wage.
The analysis did not allow for regional gender analysis of the proportion of people earning the living wage, but did provide these figures at a UK level. Women were found to be more likely than men to be paid less than the living wage. The number of men and women receiving less than the living wage has been rising for the last three years, however it has been rising at a slightly faster rate for women. This is shown in the graph below.
Jobs paying less than the living wage were found at a much higher concentration in part-time roles; the proportion of part-time jobs paying less than living wage is three times higher than full-time jobs. This has a disproportionate impact on women, as they make up 76 per cent of people working part-time in Scotland.
Female dominated sectors are also most likely to be paid less than the living wage; in Hospitality and Catering 70 per cent of jobs are paid below the living wage, and in Cleaning the figure is 68 per cent, in Retail 58 per cent and in Care 50 per cent.
Part-time work is undervalued. And that means that many of the women working part-time are working below their skill level. Until part-time work, and other types of flexible working, is available at senior levels, women will continue to be penalised when they have to reduce their hours to balance work with caring responsibilities.
EVENTS: SCOTLAND & UK WIDE
In this post you will find a selection of up and coming events and programmes relating to gender equality and women's participation in the labour market.
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Engender
Gender Matters: Equality and Inclusion Through Care Conference
Tuesday 13th October 10am - 4pm
Venue: The Lighthouse, Glasgow
FREE
Over the past two years, Engender has been working with Professor Kirstein Rummery to examine how care policy could be used to achieve gender equality, and what Scotland could learn from care policies around the world.
This conference will examine issues such as childcare and long-term care, and how these impact on gender equality, with input from expert speakers.
Feminism, Womanism and Intersectionality: An evening of film and discussion
Venue: Glasgow- GMAC
Venue: Edinburgh- Room G.06 University of Edinburgh
FREE
Join Engender, CRER (the Coalition for Racial Equality and Rights) and CEMVO (the Council for Ethnic Minority Voluntary Organsitions) for an evening of short films discussing the history of black women’s movements, campaigns for trans and gender equality, and the need for intersectional feminism. The films will be followed by interventions from an expert panel and an audience discussion.
Book for this event- Edinburgh
Who runs the world? Women's representation in public life
Thursday November 12 2015 09.00- 17.00
Venue: MacDonald Hotel, Edinburgh
The Women 5050 campaign, working with Engender, is hosting the first national conference on women's political representation in Scotland. Join Engender for an inspiring and enlightening conference which will get to the heart of why women are not afforded equal opportunities in public life, and how we can campaign for change.
Cupcakes and comedy- Women 5050 fundraiser
November 12 2015 18.30
Central Edinburgh TBC
Join Women 5050, Engender, and a fantastic line-up of comedians for an evening of laughter and feminism.
All proceeds will go to the Women 5050 campaign for equal representation.
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EQUATE SCOTLAND
Using flexible working to build a productive and engaged workforce
11 November 2015- 09.15- 13.00
FREE
Venue: Glasgow: IET Teacher Building, 14 St Enoch Square, Glasgow G1 4DB
This bespoke seminar is aimed at employers in science, engineering, technology and built environment sectors that are keen to explore flexible working and understand more about how this could work in practice within their own organisation, and bring substantial business benefits.
Speakers from CIPD and BAE will provide insight and evidence about how flexibility is good for business along with the practicalities of managing a flexible workforce. Sarah Jackson OBE, Chair of the Judging Panel of the Scottish Top Employers for Working Families Awards, will share her top tips for entering the 2016 Awards.
Find out more about this event or Book for this event
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WISE - Women in Science and Engineering
A wide range of events across the UK from small workshops through training courses to major conferences. See more information
Flexible Working Week
This week is ‘Flexible working week’ in the UK but many businesses across Scotland are still missing out on the benefits that flexibility can bring to their organisations.
A lack of flexible working is one of the key causes of the gender pay gap. Women are more likely to have caring responsibilities for children, sick relatives, disabled people, or older people, and therefore have to secure flexible working in order to balance work with family and caring responsibilities. The problem is that quality part-time and flexible working is difficult to find, particularly at senior levels. As a result, many women are working below their skill level in undervalued, low-paid jobs in which part-time work predominates. Part-time workers are also often perceived as less committed, less ambitious, and less productive than their colleagues who work full-time. This lack of visible role models working flexibly in senior jobs means that many people are reluctant to breach the subject of flexible working with their employer for fear of it damaging their career. However, many women are concerned of what will happen to their career path if they work part-time, or ask to work flexibly, because of a lack of visibility of role models at senior levels doing this.
More often than not, jobs are advertised without mentioning that flexible working may be available. This acts as a barrier to women applying, and therefore makes it more difficult for those women who are trying to progress and those who want to work in male-dominated sectors where flexible working is less likely to be available. Recent research published by Timewise found that only 6% of job adverts offered flexible working with this percentage decreasing, as salary increases, to only 2% for senior positions. The research also found that almost half of employees now want flexibility in their work life, but 42% of respondents were concerned that asking for flexibility would damage their career prospects.
Flexible working not only benefits employees but also businesses. BT has implemented a range of flexible working arrangements since the 1990s and has found a 54% improvement in productivity, a 63% reduction in absenteeism, and a retention rate of 99% for staff returning from maternity leave. BT also reported a rise in staff satisfaction and motivation, and savings on recruitment and training costs.
Close the Gap has developed an online tool to enable smaller employers to enable smaller employers to assess their employment policies and practice in areas such as flexible working. Find out more about how your business can benefit from flexible working by the Think Business Think Equality test.
August Newsround
Here we round up all the news about women in the labour market, and all things related. This month’s stories cover older women in the workplace, the university gender gap, the Think Business Think Equality launch and more.
The National
Scotland's invisible women: urgent action sought over gender gap in the workplace
App launched to help small businesses bridge the gender pay gap
The Guardian
Sexism in publishing: 'My novel wasn’t the problem, it was me, Catherine'
Mind the gender pay gap in Western Australia – women are paid $484 less
The gender pay gap is a scandal. David Cameron must act on his pledge to end it.
What does the university gender gap mean for the future of our society?
The Herald
Gender pay gap leaves women managers "working for free"
The Independent
The Telegraph
We should move quickly to eliminate the gender pay gap once and for all
International
How the pay gap between men and women starts small and gets so much bigger
How tech start-ups are closing the gender gap
RSS