TRADE UNIONS demanded a New Deal for Women Workers today to counter the problem of women “being corralled” into jobs below their skills and abilities.

Forty years after the Equal Pay Act, women are still underrepresented in higher-ranking positions and overrepresented in low skilled, low paid, part-time, precarious work, the Communication Workers’ Union (CWU) said at TUC women’s conference.

And women continue to face maternity discrimination, sexual harassment in the workplace and are discriminated against in terms of pay, the union warned.

Unite’s Zowie Thomas-Green supported the motion for a new deal, “and fast,” with the closing of the gender pay gap having “slowly ground to a halt.”

She said: “The gap for full-time workers has hardly changed since 2012.

“For part-time workers, it’s higher. And for older women it’s getting wider. Women over 50 are earning 15 per cent less than men over 50.

“We want to get rid of the gender pay gap, once and for all.”

Ms Thomas-Green suggested the government could start with “stiff fines and tough enforcement” for employers who are not taking action on fair pay.

“They need to tackle job segregation,” she said. “It’s one of the main causes of the gender pay gap. [And take] action to break down the walls that have created so-called women’s jobs and men’s jobs.

“We need a 21st-century approach to part-time work. Too often we can only find part-time work that is low paid and in what’s called ‘women’s jobs’.

“A New Deal for Women Workers means a new deal for all.”

Ms Thomas Green also called for the legal right to take cases on dual race and sex discrimination instances and for flexible working to be everyone’s right “from day one.”

“When we fight we can win,” she added. “Unite fought back against the giant outsourcing company Mitie, winning better pay for our members, both women and men. United we can win for all.”

Unison’s Davena Rankin said she was “not willing to settle for the glacial pace of change that we currently have.”

She said: “I am fecking livid at the fact that in the public sector, we are seeing the gender pay gap actually widen as the impact of austerity and government underfunding is being felt in the wage packets of the women we represent.

“It’s taking too long to close the gender pay gap. And on current trends, it will take 100 years to close the gap and part of the issue is that there is no real incentive for employers to tackle the issue.”

Ms Rankin blamed a “stubbornly high” gender pay gap in Britain on a lack of requirements for employers to compare figures and called for “louder, clearer leadership” against the gap alongside “targets that have real consequences if not met.”

Transport workers’ union TSSA delegate Maryse Thiaw-Chu said: “In the past year alone, according to data which determines how gender-equal countries are, Britain has fallen six places to number 21.

“Let's come together and demand better for women. We have nothing to lose but our chains.”

The conference called for the government to introduce a plan to abolish the gender pay gap, strong penalties against employers who do not not make inroads towards closing the gap and to conduct a review of the current Flexible Working Regulations.