Fifty years ago this week, the Irish Government received formal notification the European Commission had rejected Ireland’s request for a derogation from an Equal Pay Directive prohibiting pay discrimination between men and women. To mark May Day, our social policy officer Dr Laura Bambrick looks at similarities surrounding the push to postpone pay transparency today and equal pay in the 1970s.
This year marks the 50th anniversary of women in Ireland gaining the right to equal pay.
Up until then, it was commonplace for employers to have two separate pay scales – one for men and another, with lower rates of pay, for women. In the case of the state’s own employees, single civil and public servants got equal pay. When they married, men moved on to a higher ‘married pay scale’, which the new Free State government had introduced in 1925 and which remained in place up until 1977, while women were required to resign courtesy of a bar on the employment of married women.
Even though equal pay legislation in the 1970s put a stop to such blatant pay discrimination, 50 years on women workers in the Irish workforce still earn on average about 90 cents for every euro earned by men for each hour worked.
Lifting the veil on pay secrecy
Secrecy surrounding pay has been identified as contributing to between 10-20% of the gender pay gap, which a new EU Pay Transparency Directive intends to lift the veil on.
Women workers are more likely to under-price themselves in initial salary negotiations and are less likely to ask for a pay rise thereafter. However, where they know what an employer hiring is willing to pay or pays their colleagues doing similar work, the evidence shows it narrows the ‘ask gap’ that perpetuates unequal pay.
Under the directive, Irish workers will gain the right to:
- Know how much a job pays before applying.
- No longer be questioned on their pay history in job interviews.
- No longer be prevented from disclosing their pay to colleagues.
- Know how much male and female colleagues doing similar work are paid on average.
- No longer be required to demonstrate they are being underpaid in equal pay cases. The burden of proof shifts to the employer to prove they are not discriminating.
Despite having had three years to prepare for pay transparency, business representatives are intensely lobbying, both here and in Europe, to delay implementing the new rules. With only weeks to the 7 June deadline, Government has signalled its intent for implementation: late, piecemeal and prioritising the needs of business over working women. Echoes of the efforts to postpone the Equal Pay Directive in 1976 ring loud.
O Lord, make me pure. But not yet.
On 1 July 1974 the Anti-Discrimination (Pay) Bill was signed into law by President Erskine Childers. This was the first piece of employment equality legislation on the Irish statue book. It gave working women a right to be paid the same rate as their male colleagues for equal work or work of equal value, and vice versa. At the time, women’s pay rates were around half (53%) the men’s rate on average, including those covered by a collective agreement.
Employers had until 31 December 1975 to end pay discrimination. Business representatives complained loudly and often that an 18-month lead-in time was insufficient for employers. But the deadline had been set by Government to fulfil its obligations to implement an Equal Pay Directive from Brussels which would become fully binding in all member states from 12 February 1976. However, in the aftermath of an oil and energy crisis arising from conflict in the Middle East and the onset of petrol shortages, price spirals and recession, business groups stepped up their campaign to postpone the Act coming into force.
On 9 January 1976, weeks before the deadline, the Cabinet approved an amending bill to the Anti-Discrimination (Pay) Act giving struggling businesses and the civil and public service a temporary exemption from the requirement to pay equal pay. The Minister for Foreign Affairs Garrett FitzGerald was tasked with getting approval from the European Commission for a derogation from the Equal Pay Directive up until 31 December 1977.
After a forceful campaign of opposition mounted by trade union women and other women activists, the Commission rejected Ireland’s application to delay the rules of equal pay between men and women for two years, thus confirming the Anti-Discrimination (Pay) Act was law from its original 1 January 1976 commencement date.
History repeats itself
Fast forward fifty years to today, with the 7 June deadline fast approaching, the Pay Transparency Directive is facing the same strong resistance from business representatives and Government foot-dragging.
ICTU President Phil Ní Sheaghdha and General Secretary Owen Reidy wrote to the Minister for Equality Norma Foley calling on Government not to leave 1.3 million women workers carrying the cost of the gender pay gap in lost wages for longer. In reply, to The Irish Times, the Department of Equality has said the new rules to bring Ireland into compliance with the Directive will be brought in on a phased basis and that companies will not be penalised for failing to meet the EU deadline. Meanwhile, the necessary legislation was not included in the list of bills prioritised for drafting during the Dáil’s summer term. At this pace, we can expect to see the bills giving effect to October’s budget published, passed and the changes come into force before the pay transparency bill gets its first reading.
The infringement fines clock starts ticking on 8 June for failure to transpose the Pay Transparency Directive into Irish law in full and on time, and, yet again, working women in Ireland will need to rely on Brussels to vindicate our right to equal treatment in employment.
