Sex and Gender Issues at Work - Essay Example

Letter. Dear Ms Samrita Kaur, Legal Advice in respect of the unequal remuneration. With reference to the above, I am of the consideredopinion that you have a strong case against your employer Vis – à – Vis the unequal payment made to you for services rendered. You have stated that you have been working for Modern Computers Ltd, since the past five years and that your main responsibilities included the preparation of around twenty to thirty meals daily for the directors and their guests. You have further stated that, three of your male colleagues, who are also chefs in the company for the past five years, are paid a higher salary than what you are paid. This is a clear - cut case of Discrimination based on Sex. ­When you apprised your personnel manager about this disparity in the salary being paid to you, the personnel manager took no cognizance of your claim. The legal position with respect to your claim is that The Equal Pay Act of 1970(as amended on July 2003) makes it imperative for employers to pay the same wages for the same work to both men and women and that there should be no discrimination on the basis of gender. Therefore, your employer has transgressed the law. Hence, you can apply to The Employment Tribunal for claiming equal remuneration. Based on the decisions given by various courts in the United Kingdom in similar cases, I can assure you that you will definitely get remuneration equal to what has been paid to you male colleagues. The number of such gender bias cases is very many and in most of these cases, the applicant has been successful. Yours Sincerely, Solicitors. Report. Ms. Samrita Kaur has approached our firm in order to obtain legal aid as she is of the opinion that she has been discriminated against by her employer in respect of the remuneration being paid to her, since this was less than what her male colleagues were being paid. In this connection, she further states that her personnel manager chose to ignore her claim for higher remuneration. It is my opinion that under these circumstances, she has no other alternative than to approach The Employment Tribunal to seek redressal for her grievance. The Equal Pay Act 1970 (EPA) gives an individual a right to the same contractual pay and benefits as a person of the opposite sex in the same employment where the man and woman are doing: Like work; or Work rated as equivalent under an analytical job evaluation study ; or Work that is proved to be of equal value. The E.P.A has been interpreted to cover indirect as well as direct sex discrimination. In other words, the E.P.A will be applicable to cases where the pay difference is due to a condition or practice, which applies to men and women but which adversely, affects a considerably larger proportion of one sex than the other and further, when it is not justifiable, irrespective of sex, to apply that condition or practice. The appropriate statutory procedure to be followed is that the aggrieved woman has to submit a written application regarding her grievance to her employer. After this, she has to allow twenty – eight days to elapse before she can approach The Employment Tribunal for redressal of her grievance. Ms. Samrita Kaur states that twenty – eight days have already elapsed, since she had placed her claim with the management. Ms. Samrita Kaur has submitted a copy of this claim, acknowledged by her employer Modern Computer Ltd, to us. Based on the foregoing facts, we can file a case with The Employment Tribunal for redressal of Ms. Samrita Kaur’s grievance under the provisions of The Equal Pay Act (Section 2(1)). The detailed procedure to be adopted, in general, is that, the aggrieved woman has to apply to The Employment Tribunal while she is in the employment to which the claim relates or within six months of the date on which she was last employed in that employment (Section 27 A of The Equal Pay Act). However, The Employment Tribunal is vested with the discretionary power to extend this six-month time limit in some equal pay cases. Such cases are those where the employer had either a) deliberately concealed any relevant fact from the woman, and the woman did not discover the fact (or could not have reasonably discovered it) during the employment, or b) the woman was what is legally described as “under a disability” during the six months after the end of employment when she would otherwise have had to present her complaint. Women who have long-standing cases of pay discrimination are entitled to receive back pay for up to six years in England. In cases of concealment by the employer or disability of the employee, these time limits for back pay can be extended at the discretion of The Employment Tribunal. When a woman applies to a The Employment Tribunal claiming equal pay with a man, The Employment Tribunal will first consider whether her claim could be dealt with as a claim of like work or work rated as equivalent. If equal pay is due on one of these grounds, or would be due but for a material difference between the woman’s case and the man’s, then The Employment Tribunal will reach its decision under these provisions. The Employment Tribunal is required is to follow special rules of procedure in cases where the issue is a question as to whether the claimant and the comparator are doing work of equal value (Section 2 A). The Employment Tribunal may decide to appoint an independent expert, in which case the equal value procedure consists of three stages, where the issues in dispute between the parties are very clear and The Employment Tribunal feels that it can determine the question without reference to an independent expert, the second stage is omitted. Any requirement to hold an equal value hearing does not prevent The Employment Tribunal from holding more than one of each of these types of hearing. At the same time, it does not prevent any other hearing being held in accordance with the main rules of The Employment Tribunal. In the famous case of Jamstalldhets Ombusmannen, the primary issue is what aspect of an applicant’s pay can be compared with what element of the comparators. The Advocate – General’s opinion confirms the R. ainey principle ([1987] 1RLR 26) that each element of the pay packet that can be compared; “treating each element of remuneration independently for the purpose of an equal pay comparison, will in general be the only proper way to ensure equality”. If such a separation of these elements is not possible, then the Advocate General advises that a global assessment will have to be performed. “In that case, the mere fact that the structure is not transparent means that the employer retains the burden of disproving alleged discrimination”. (Jamstalldhets Ombusmannen V. Oreboro Lans Landsting. C – 256/99). Our client Ms. Samrita Kaur has been working as a cook for the past five years. Her main responsibilities include preparing around twenty to thirty meals for the directors and their guests each day. Her work entails a great deal of attention to detail and the exercise of great care, since she prepares meals for the top management and the guests of the top management of the company. Our client therefore, has to take great care and her work has to be of the best quality in comparison to her other male colleagues, who cook for the rest of the employees of the company. These male colleagues of our client consequently do not have to pay as much attention to detail as our client has to. Section 1(4) of The Equal Pay Act, envisages that a woman is regarded as employed on like work to that of a man, where she is doing the same work as he is, or work of a broadly similar nature. This means that any difference between the jobs must not be of practical importance in relation to terms and conditions of employment. In order to determine whether a woman is employed on a like work, account needs to be taken of the nature of any differences between her work and the work of a man, how vast the differences are and how frequent is their occurrence in practice. From the foregoing, it is crystal clear that the similarity of jobs should be considered in the broader sense. Our client Ms. Samrita Kaur and her male comparators are working for the same employer and the nature of their work is similar in the broader sense, as they are all working as chefs in this company for the past five years. Moreover, our client is catering to the directors and their guests, which implies that her work is of greater importance than her male comparators who cook for the rest of the employees. In view of these facts, I conclude that our client is to be paid in a manner akin to that her male comparators are being paid. I am including two cases wherein the aggrieved parties in cases of sex discrimination were redressed by The Employment Appellate Tribunal. 1. Appeal No. UKEAT/0396/05/MAA dated 14 September 2005. Ms. Miles Appellant. V. Ms. Galbank Respondent. The appellant’s case is that she had joined the respondent’s company in May 1997. The respondent is the trainee manager. The appellant was trained and made a senior hair designer and trainee manger. In 2003, the appellant suffered from glandular fever; on resumption of work, she continued to work happily until February 2004, when she became pregnant. All of a sudden, her superiors started to discriminate against her. All her complaints regarding the work place were treated with derision and mockery. She was blatantly told that all her problems were due to her pregnancy and that there was nothing wrong with her. The appellant made out a case of Sex Discrimination against her employer. The tribunal granted damages to the claimant, which was contested by the respondents. The Employment Appellate Tribunal dismissed the appeal by the employers and upheld the Tribunal’s decision. 2. Appeal No. UKEAT/0541/04/DZN dated 27 May 2005. Ms. C Athis Appellant. V. The Blue Coat School Respondent. In this case, Ms. C Athis was denied promotion whereas her male colleague was promoted. This happened while the appellant was absent on maternity leave. The appellant was recognized and praised by the school management for her competence and excellence on several occasions. The ostensible cause for this denial of promotion was her pregnancy. This was tantamount to Sex Discrimination. The Tribunal did not consider her claim for promotion. The Employment Appellate Tribunal in its judgement decided that The Tribunal had taken a wrong decision and while allowing the appeal of Ms. C Athis, it also recommended that the school should promote the appellant without going in for further hearing by the Tribunal. It is evident from that the foregoing that Sex Discrimination Cases are viewed very seriously by the Tribunals and the Appellate Bodies. Our client has very good chances to win and she will get arrears for the past five years. I recommend that we proceed legally against her employers for justice. Sources. 1. Jeanette N. Cleveland, Margaret Stockdale, Kevin R. Murphy.  Women and Men in Organizations: Sex and Gender Issues at Work (n. d.). 2. The Equal Pay Act 1970. (As Amended in 2003.) 3. The Sex Discrimination Act. 1975. 4. Unequal pay could cost councils. Retrieved on Monday, 15 August 2005, 07:44 GMT 08:44 UK from BBC NEWS / SCOTLAND. Web site: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/scotland/4151246.stm 5. Court risk over equal pay review. Retrieved on Wednesday, 23 November 2005, 11:42 GMT from BBC NEWS WORLD EDITION. Web site: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/4462224.stm. 6. NUS Women’s Campaign in partnership with the Equal Opportunities Commission. Equal Pay Handbook. Web site: www.nusonline.co.uk/women. 7. Human Rights of Women: National and International Perspectives. Edited by Rebecca J Cook. University of Pennsylvania Press. 8. The Feminist Dilemma: When Success is Not Enough. Diana Stolba. American Enterprise Institute. 9. Suppressed, Forced Out and Fired: How Successful Women Lose Their Jobs. Martha E Reeves. Quorum/Greenwood. 10. Women and Workplace Discrimination: Overcoming Barriers to Gender Equality. Raymond F Gregory. Rutgers University Press. Read More