The Right to Be Equal

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The Right to Be Equal

• Unit 3 The Changing Role of Women in the
  Twentieth Century

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What is equality?
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On 28th March, 1917, the House of Commons voted
341 to 62 that women over the age of 30 who
were householders the wives of householders
occupiers of property with an annual rent of 5
graduates of British universities should be
allowed to vote. MPs rejected the idea of
granting the vote to women on the same terms as
men.
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In 1918 women could still NOT.
Work when they got married
Be a solicitor, barrister or magistrate
Join the armed forces
Earn as much as men
Have a professionor career with promotion
prospects
Go around without a hat in a public place
Wear ordinary clothes in the evening
Participate in sporting competitions
Use birth control
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Women STILL.
Worked in Domestic Service when men came back
from World War One, often these were the only
jobs available for the women who had taken on the
male role. There were 2 million women in domestic
service in 1939, just as there had been in 1914
and they were paid 25p a week.
Had to stop working in teaching, medicine or the
civil service when they got married.
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After WW1 there was an increase in womens
legislation passed by parliament and Women MPs
were elected for the first time.
The Sex Disqualification Removal Act 1919
The Representation of the People Act 1928
BUT Think about all the things that women still
couldnt do..
Was the vote enough?
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Who campaigned for change after the Suffragettes?
The same voting right for women as men
Other groups included the creation of Womens
Trade Unions and the Womens Institute (what we
know as the W.I.)
Fairer divorce laws
Equal pay
End to discrimination in the professions
Est. 1918 after the WSPU and NUWSS disbanded
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Women between the Wars 1918-1939

• The Womens Movement seemed in decline between
  the wars.
• When men came back home from the Front in 1918
  they took their jobs back
• They got the vote which was what they had
  campaigned for, for so long.
• There was a cult of domesticity associated
  with the mass circulation of magazines such as
  Women

• Marriage rates rose dramatically
• The number of local branches of the NUSEC
  dropped significantly from 220 in 1920 to 48 in
  1935

THINK ABOUT IT! Why did womens fight for
equality decline so much in the interwar years?
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Women in World War Two
Industrial Conscription 1941
Womens Land Army July 1939
Womens Voluntary Service
Factory Work
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Doris Terry
We didn't miss the freedom of our husbands
being away because there wasn't much freedom to
miss. It was just that we had been given a new
view of ourselves. "In the WAAF I had equal
standing with the men. I was somebody, instead of
a mother, daughter or wife. I even had a trade,
tele-printing. My views were considered
important. "It's impossible for young people to
understand how much we were second class
citizens. The Government expected us to slip back
into the same mode and so did the men but we
didn't want to. We wanted to work because we saw
that we could."
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Jean Hooker
"What it needs is a whole change in attitude. The
same arguments we were having in the 1940s were
still going on in the 1960s. "The expectations
of younger women were that we could do anything
men could but it didn't stop employers thinking
there were men's jobs and women's jobs. "The
view in London was also very different to that in
Scotland or the provinces. There a woman belonged
in the home."
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Think About It! How important was the role
women played in World War Two? Do you think that
this changed peoples attitudes? What do you
think happened after 1945?
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Women after 1945
At the end of the war the Government and the
soldiers thought women would slip back into the
old way of life, happily relinquishing their jobs
and settling back into being wives and mothers.
Men had cherished dreams of family life while
fighting abroad and after several years apart,
many families found it very difficult to make
things work.
Nurseries and crèches that had been set up all
over London to enable women to work were all
closed
Mothers and children had formed bonds that
fathers felt left out of. For a lot of children
their fathers were total strangers.
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A Glimmer of light? The birth of the welfare
state provided employment opportunities for women
as bureaucracy created jobs.
Girls born in the 1950s still did not have equal
access to education. In fact places at schools
were limited for them because they did better
than boys!
Women After 1945
Although London County Council led the way by
allowing married women to continue as teachers
shortly before the war, there were still many
professions where women had to stop working when
they married.
Even the Labour government was not committed to
equality. Clement Atlee threatened to resign and
Churchill said he would force a vote of
confidence in the Government if Parliament passed
a law giving women teachers equal pay.
But it was attitudes that proved resistant to
change. While it became easier for women to work,
there were still jobs considered off limits.
Matters were not resolved for decades, if they
ever have been.
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The Sexual Revolution of the 1950s and 60s
Think about it! Why was the fact that
contraception was more freely available,
important to the growing womens movement?
Women advocated Birth Control women should have
power over their own bodies. (Marie Stopes)
From the 1950s the Contraceptive Pill was made
available more freely, pre-empting radical
changes in society.
But in the 1950s a womans place was still seen
to be in the home and she was not entitled to
equal pay or treatment at work.
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The Womens Liberation Movement

• Believed that women had the right to be equal
  with men
• This included in work and wages
• And in Society
• Their campaigning led directly to the
  legislation of 1970 and 1975

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Women were saying that what is most personal is
political and they were questioning and
redefining their roles as wives, mothers, workers
and lovers in the light of their own experience,
rather than through men's eyes. Some of the
women felt the sexual revolution of the sixties
had given them the right to say yes, feminism
told them it was OK to say no.
The 1960s Burning Bras and campaigning for
change.
American women like Betty Friedan wrote of their
dissatisfaction with their lot as wives and
mothers. For anyone other than the upper classes,
childcare and the running of the home was still
considered woman's work, forcing women to choose
between their talents and their family lives.
In 1968 the women's liberation movement had its
first major raft of publicity when women
demonstrated at the Miss America competition and
threw their stiletto heels in the bin
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KEY QUESTION How Important has legislation been
in securing equality for women in British
Society?
Sex Discrimination Act
Equal Pay Act
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Gave women over 21 equal voting status to men.
Back
Now that women were able to vote the Labour Party
became a stronger political force because they
favoured womens issues.
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In theory made it illegal to exclude women from
jobs because of their gender.
Back
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Industrial Conscription
Back
By 1943 there were 7.25 million women employed in
industry, agriculture, the armed forces and civil
defence organisations.
In 1943, the shortage of women in the factories
and on land lead to the government stopping women
joining the armed forces. They were given a
choice of either working on the land or in
factories. Those who worked on land did a very
valuable job for the British people.
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THE WLA
In August 1940, only 7,000 women had joined but
as Hitlers U Boats kept attacking British ships
carrying supplies people were worried that the
country would starve.
Back
In fact, the work was hard and young women
usually worked in isolated communities. Many
lived in years old farm workers cottages without
running water, electricity or gas.
The government tried to make out that the work
of the WLA was glamorous and adverts showed it as
this.
Winter, in particular, could be hard especially
as the women had to break up the soil by hand
ready for sowing.
However, many of the women ate well as there was
a plentiful supply of wild animals in the
countryside - rabbit, hares, pheasant and
partridges. They were paid 32 shillings a week -
about 1.60.
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Women worked in all manner of production ranging
from making ammunition to uniforms to aeroplanes.
Women and Factory Work
Back
The hours they worked were long and some women
had to move to where the factories were. Those
who moved away were paid more.
Skilled women could earn 2.15 a week. To them
this must have seemed a lot. But men doing the
same work were paid more. In fact, it was not
unknown for unskilled men to get more money that
skilled female workers.
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The WVS (Womens Voluntary Service)
Back
During the Blitz on London women in voluntary
organisations did a very important job.
The WVS also provided tea and refreshments for
those who sheltered in the Underground in London.
The Womens Voluntary Service provided fire
fighters with tea and refreshments when the
clear-up took place after a bombing raid.
The WVS had one million members by 1943.
The WVS did whatever was needed. In Portsmouth,
they collected enough scrap metal to fill four
railway carriages..in just one month.
When not on call they knitted socks, balaclavas
etc for servicemen, sometimes even adopting a
sailor to provide for.
Most were quite elderly as the younger women were
in the factories or working on farms and were too
exhausted to do extra work once they had finished
their shift.
They also looked after people who had lost their
houses in the blitz
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Equal Pay Act 1970
The Equal Pay Act 1970 made it illegal for
employers to discriminate between men and women
in terms of their pay and conditions where they
are doing the same work. 
In 1970 the pay gap between men and women stood
at 37
Back
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Sex Discrimination Act 1975
The Sex Discrimination Act 1975 (SDA) applies to
both men and women and makes sex discrimination
illegal in employment and vocational training,
education, the provision and sale of goods,
facilities and services and premises.
Back