Labour’s women-friendly work policies are anything but

Labour has pledged to close the gender pay gap by 2030 and the party has chosen today – ‘Equal Pay Day’ – to launch its supposedly women-friendly work policies. The party plans to force small and medium-sized companies to perform gender pay gap audits, just as bigger companies of 250 are required to do already. This sounds all very feminist if you are one of the women for whom career is a priority. No ambitious, career-oriented woman wants to be underpaid relative to male colleagues for equal work. According to sociologist Catherine Hakim, though, this only comprises some 20 per cent of working women. The vast majority – some 60 per cent in the UK and US – prefer to balance work and family life more equally. For these women, Labour’s proposed policy is disastrous. For a start, it will create a perverse incentive for even small companies to get rid of women in lower-paid roles.