Equal shites

4 September 2008.

A report has found women are still struggling for equality in the workplace. The latest in an endless line of surveys shows a fall in the number of females reaching the top of their profession. What a surprise it is to see that this survey came from the eternal irritant that is the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

Dissecting the bigger picture, firstly the state pension age for women is lower than for men so at any one time there cannot possibly be the same number of women at the top as men. If this commission wants equality, enforce an equal pension age. Indeed, since women live an average of a year or two longer than men, the state pension age could arguably be higher for females. Of course trying to push that legislation through would be about as successful as Kevin Federline’s music career.

Next, since when were men and women supposed to be equally good at all jobs? There are undoubtedly some jobs women are far superior at and any struggle to reach the top of these professions should be greeted with more concern than a hurricane approaching New Orleans. But for those where men are clearly likely to perform better there should be no scrutiny as to why women are not present in the top echelons here.

Furthermore, statistics like these are ravaged with over-simplicity. There are always exceptions to the rule, such that some unusual women will excel at disciplines they are not expected to. Attempts to group humans with infinite differences in intelligence, emotion and physique into just two categories is as futile as demanding Alistair Darling trims his eyebrows.

Moreover, it is often the creative areas where women excel. These disciplines, however, tend to be devoid of male-created bureaucratic hierarchical structures which have the benefit of clear career ladder progression opportunities.

Although there has been extensive investment in fertility, and recently a “man” gave birth, either we stop having children and rely on more immigration to prevent the population floundering or we continue to let women take time off work to bring up their offspring.

And unless we magically develop a way to let men breastfeed then the mother has to be the one who nurtures the child through the early months too. Endless studies have shown the benefits of consumption of breast milk rather than alternatives. But hey if you want your kids to grow up as misfits, back the EHRC.

Once the initial months have elapsed there can be flexibility. I bet I could find a million of men who would quite readily stay at home in front of the telly with one eye on the children, and let the wife be the breadwinner. Somehow I can’t see that being promoted by the ECHR, however, because that doesn’t ensure that all women are in all the top jobs earning all the money as our “equality” friends would like.

What the commission has the cheek to discuss is the discrimination going on which is halting women’s progress. Since when was half the front line in Afghanistan filled with female soldiers? When will half of all dustmen (amazing how that is one profession where you do not have to say dustperson yet you do chairperson – wonder why that is) collecting my refuse each week be women? What a surprise it is, then, that the survey focuses on only the top end of the glamour professions such as law and not the jobs more horrific than spending the night with Ann Widdecombe.

When the government stops its policy of positive discrimination towards women in the public sector, and when it introduces legislation granting equal paternity and maternity leave, and when we remove the process of women sleeping their way up the ladder ahead of more qualified male counterparts, then maybe we can start to consider listening to the ECHR, a body which as done about as much for human rights as China.

The fact that it is insinuated that women do not make it to the top simply because men in charge do not think they are up to the job is a complete fallacy. Of course there will always be one or two misogynistic idiots who think women are incapable of even getting out of bed in the morning without breaking a nail, but to suggest the majority of males believe women are inferior is wildly inaccurate.

In fact, since allegedly men think about sex every 6 seconds or whatever the latest figure is, if a male manager is given the choice of two equally eligible candidates of which one is male and one is an attractive female, who do you think he is going to choose? Boardrooms in many professions need a balance of skills, qualities which often only women possess.

Perhaps the ECHR will shut up if:

1. Working from home is more readily available. So many jobs now involve nothing but sitting at a desk in front of a computer screen, all of which can be done at home. Introduce teleworking wherever possible and then you can bring up the children and have a job. This will alleviate the reliance on nurseries and nannies which often leads to attention deficit disorder. Also, heaven forbid in this day and age but you could actually have both parents at home to raise a child.

Watch the fall in gang crime as children no longer have to deal with a lack of father figure at home. Indeed, both parents together raising a child may limit the number of couples getting divorced and their children having to deal with broken homes and the negative consequences that are known to abound from that. Meetings wouldn’t be a problem either, as there cannot be so little flexibility that both parents would have to be in meetings at exactly the same time such that the child is neglected. In any case, the increasing prevalence of conference calls has rendered most meetings needless.

2. More employers introduced nurseries at the workplace. Plenty of offices and warehouses are large enough to warrant a segment being allocated for a nursery. Parents can then pop and see their child on cigarette and lunch breaks, and there is no issue with a child being left if the parent works late.

3. Human resource departments (often littered with women and men with an equal measure of oestrogen floating around inside them) did more to recognise the talents of its workforce. Too often promotion is left to those at the top who are too busy to view the skills of its staff. When someone leaves and a post becomes available, it is often left to traditional mechanisms such as sex or simply who the boss has spent most time with to decide who fills the vacated slot (in more ways than one). If HR allocated more of their time to continually identifying qualities in the existing talent pool then such issues would not arise during staff turnover.

4. Women started more of their own businesses. This concept of a glass ceiling is a common reason for female entrepreneurship but still the number of male-owned start-ups is much higher than female-directed. Women are automatically at the top, therefore, and can employ and promote as many women as they see fit, as well as gearing work around issues such as raising the children. In reality, entrepreneurs are usually risk takers, given the knowledge that the majority of start-ups are doomed to failure. But most women are more risk averse than their male equivalents thus perhaps the ECHR should do something useful and try to overcome this aversion.