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Mothers ‘cannot have it all’ in 2013

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mother's rights, feminism, european parliament, international women's day, childcareThe financial and economic crisis increases a working mother’s chances of not having very much at all.

Each year the European Parliament celebrates International Women’s Day with an event that brings together European and national MPs from parliamentary committees for equal opportunities.

In 2013 the event focused on the theme “Women’s response to the crisis”.

Women’s Views on News was there.

While informative and enlightening, the information presented was not positive news for women in the UK.

And it showed a true reflection of what women, especially those who choose to have children and also work, are confronted with today.

Elisabeth Morin-Chartier, vice chair of FEMM, the EU’s committee for women’s rights and equality, and rapporteur at the Brussels event, said: “Women are facing a silent pernicious crisis which worsens and weakens their condition.

“Before the crisis there were already more women affected than men by unemployment, precarious work, part-time, low wages and slow careers.”

These jobs were the first to go in the crisis and continue to be the main jobs held by women who have child care responsibilities.

She continued: “Today, as a result of austerity policies, they suffer a double punishment. This is an issue at the heart of political equality and employment.

“I say stop to the decline of women in society.”

As a result of cuts in social security benefits and to the budget for social welfare infrastructure, such as education, childcare, health and care services, women have left employment or been forced to reduce their working hours, thus increasing the feminisation of poverty.

And part-time employment has a long term impact, not only diminishing their current, working income and rights, but affecting the level of their pensions as well.

Vice chair on Gender Equality, Edite Estrela, MEP, said that the European Council is refusing to move on maternity leave proposals.

As it stands, the directive is 20 years old and considered out of date and incapable of meeting current needs.

Women should be in a position to be able to look after their children in the early years instead of feeling obliged to return to work early because of  financial pressures or because of threats to job security.

She said: “The crisis should not be used to downgrade women. We shouldn’t accept that there is money for banks but not for women.”

It seems that the current view is that maternity periods are considered a burden on the economy.

Fertility figures are currently low and Europe is threatened by a social security crisis.  The committee wants to ensure policies are in place which encourage women to have children rather than discourage, or make it difficult for them.

But the average pay inequality across Europe at hiring point is 17 per cent. This is in part due to periods of maternity leave and women taking careers breaks to care for their children.

And the pay gap rises for every child she has. For each child birth and period of maternity leave, her wage drops by 12 per cent.

Women then return to work taking on roles with fewer responsibilities so they can care for their children and they may find that they do not have enough support to do more than work part time.

A woman’s career curve is therefore not as steep as a man’s as she assumes child care responsibilities while he continues to progress up the career ladder.

It is unacceptable that women receive less money than men for doing the same job and do not have the same opportunities as men available to them.

The European Parliament asked TNS Opinion to carry out a Flash telephone survey to look at the impact of the crisis.

The fieldwork was carried out between 4 and 7 February 2013 in the 27 EU member states, and 25,556 European citizens were interviewed, 1,010 of whom were in the UK.

Almost one in three Europeans said that the crisis has in particular worsened the pay gap (30 per cent) and made it more difficult for women to reconcile their private and working lives (30 per cent).

As part of the survey, Europeans were asked about the most important aspects which an employer takes into account when recruiting a man or a woman.

The criteria highlighted differ radically depending on whether the recruitment concerns a man or a woman.

And in the UK, 52 per cent of women considered employers attach the most significance to whether a woman has children or not when deciding whether to recruit her.

The FEMM committee members believe that, despite unemployment rates for men and women being comparable, the crisis affects women differently: working conditions for women have become considerably more insecure, their income has diminished and part-time and fixed-term contract employment has increased, to the detriment of more stable employment.

The committee approved a set of proposals aiming to address the impact of the crisis on gender equality:  investing in lifelong training and new jobs, investing in public transport, and developing child care facilities are among the proposals to be voted on in the European Parliament on 12 March 2013.

The report, ‘The Impact of the Economic Crisis on Gender Equality and Women’s Rights’ , produced following the results of the Flash survey confirmed that Europe needs to be proactive, not just reactive in dealing with the inequalities women face in the labour force.

At the time of writing the outcome of the vote had not yet been published.

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