Committee Reports > List of Committees > Joint > 1991 > Committee on Women's Rights (3rd Committee) > Report No. 01 - Motherhood, Work and Equal Opportunity A Case Study of Irish Civil Servants

APPENDIX

MOTHERHOOD, WORK AND EQUAL OPPORTUNITY

A CASE STUDY OF IRISH CIVIL SERVANTS

Prepared for the Joint Oireactas Committee on Women's Rights

Evelyn Mahon
Centre for Women's Studies
University of Limerick

Acknowledgements

Many people contributed in different ways to this study. I would like to thank the Joint Oireactas Committee on Women’s Rights for funding the study. I would also like to thank Ms.Monica Bames, Chairwoman of the Committee, Mary Wallace (Vice-Chairwoman) and David Norris for their perceptive comments on the first draft and to the other Committee members for their interest and support. Mr Seamus Killeen as Clerk to the Committee was at all times very accommodating, supportive and helpful.

Special thanks are due to Mr. Tom Clarke, Dept. of Finance who was very helpful in the initial stages of the study, and to the Personnel staff and others in all the Departments who supplied the data requested and facilitated the arrangement of interviews.

Very special thanks are due to researcher Mary O’Donoughue, who painstakingly transcribed the taped interviews, a task only relieved by their interesting content; to Eilis O’Connor, who assisted in the coding and analysis and to Joan Hanafin who provided me with invaluable help and incisive comment.

Ms. Susan Horrigan, Dept. of Languages and Applied Social Studies, transformed my first draft into this elegant format and Ms. Marie Kirwan, Secretary in the Department provided invaluable secretarial support.

My greatest debt is to the eighty five women who provided me with excellent interviews as they spoke honestly about their family and working lives. I hope that I have accurately represented their views. During the field research I was very impressed by these women. The majority worked long days coping with the demands of family and home, in many respects against all the odds, tracing new behavioural patterns for Irish women. Many of them I know enjoyed the interviews as it gave them an opportunity to talk about the combination of family and work, and in particular their experiences at work. The aim of the study is not just to record their experiences as told in 1988, but to help and improve the position of women at work. It will I hope increase awareness of equal opportunities policy and enable women, who wish to combine paid work and childrearing, to do so without fear of encountering discrimination.

CHAPTER ONE

The Participation of Women in the Labour Force

Historical Background

The separation of work from home which occurred during the industrial revolution changed the nature of women’s economic activity. Peasant farming and home crafts were replaced by mechanised production and manufacturing industries. In working class families, childcare became a task which was difficult to combine with work away from home. Women continued to work but under very difficult circumstances. An evolution in worker’s rights over time introduced labour laws etc., which improved the nature of the workplace, prevented mass exploitation but deemed the workplace an unsuitable place for women. Of course, this did not mean that women did not continue to work, rather the work they did curtailed them in so much as it had to be suited to their child care tasks. i.e. home work, washing, street sales, shopkeeping, giving lodgings i.e. work with flexible hours or which allowed them to be accompanied by children became ’women’s work’. Wealthy or aristocratic women did not have to look after children, instead they employed nannies and nurses to mind them while they busied themselves as mistresses of their households. Gradually a middle social class attitude emerged whereby it was more appropriate for wives not to work - imitative of their aristocratic sisters. The importance of children and the longer period of childhood, with new emphasis on children’s psychological development were all part of this social development. In time the rising working class also wished to have non-working wives. It became a feature of their wish to share a middle class life-style and so they looked for a ’family’ wage which would mean that their wives would no longer be economically forced to work. The idea that wives and mothers should not work or in some cases be forced to work was becoming quite a widespread one at the beginning of the twentieth century. This idea was also central to Catholic social teaching which assigned women a complementary role to that of men, in part recognising the importance of women’s role in the home and assuming the male as breadwinner. (O’Dowd 87)

This idea of a woman’s place in the home was enshrined in the 1937 Constitution and so facilitated legislation which excluded married women from the permanent workforce of the Civil Service, banks and Unions, a ban which persisted until 1973. Of course women still worked… part-time or as temporary workers or hidden in the black economy. An examination of the census data reveals that married women worked as landladies, teachers and shopkeepers. (Mahon’86) However despite prevalent ideology, economic matters have sometimes taken priority over social attitudes as for instance during the War in Great Britain and in the USA when a shortage of male workers created a need for women workers. Suddenly to assist them nurseries etc. were established and they received extensive training in ’male skills’. This has been the case again recently in England, where a shortage of workers has meant that the Civil Service has had to organise nurseries in order to hold on to their ’mums’. We will see subsequently that economic need still shapes policy on child care and the promotion of women in the workplace.

This chapter will show that there are three ways in which women’s economic activity differs from men’s: (1) participation and non-participation in the work-force, (c/f table i,p.3) (2) distribution in the workforce i.e. horizontal segregation (c/f table ii,p.3) and (3) the position or grade occupied within the organisation i.e. vertical segregation (c/f Table 1 chap.3 p.21 )

Women’s Participation in the Irish Labour Force

The participation rate of Irish women in the labour market, 31.9%, is the lowest in the EC (Blackwell 1989 p.8), due mainly to the low employment rate of married women. Historically, a number of factors militated against their participation: the Constitution enshrined a complementary domestic role for women in the home, legislation until 1973 prohibited the employment of married women in the Civil service and in banks. (Mahon’87)

Legal and social changes in the seventies e.g. the removal of the marriage bar, Employment Equality legislation and maternity protection, did result in an increase in the proportion of women in paid employment. Women are now 32% of the employed labour force. There has been an increase in the percentage of married women working: from 4.8% in 1951 to 23.4% in 1987. By 1987 married women made up 39.6% of women in the labour force. (Blackwell’89 p.7) Women aged 25-44 now account for 40% of the female labour force as opposed to 26% in 1971.

Since the elimination of the marriage bar in 1973, family size rather than marriage per se is a major factor in explaining variation in women’s participation. Family size has declined from an average of 5 children in 1961 to 4.7 in 1981 to an estimated 2.4 children in 1988. The age of the youngest child is also a major factor. The larger the number of dependent children and the younger the age of the youngest child, the lower the activity rate is. Blackwell’s analysis shows that as the number of dependent children rises, the activity rates of married women decline. (Blackwell ’89 p.15) When asked to give reason for not working, 70% of women cited child care or other family responsibilities as the reason. (Women in Europe Report ’87) Despite the rise in women’s activity rates over time, Irish women’s activity rates remain much lower than in the EC as a whole.

Blackwell notes the emergence of a trend among younger cohorts of women to remain economically active even when the peak of child-rearing years arrive. Among these the biggest increase in participation was among married women aged between 20 and 24 which went up from 15% in 1971 to 35% in 1981 and those aged between 25 and 29 which increased from 10.5% to 26.5% during the same period. This he attributes to their difficulty in returning to the labour market after a period out of it. (Blackwell’89 p. 10) The increasing costs of childrearing and settting up a new household have been factors cited as explanations of this rapid growth in the proportion of married women continuing to work after marriage. (Breen, Hannan Rottman & Whelan p. 117). The removal of the marriage bar, equal pay legislation, a decline in family size, greater acceptability of mothers in the labour force and young women’s interest in continuing to work are all thought to contribute to the explanation of this increased participation.

TABLE (I) Principal Economic Status of Women and Men 1987

Source Labour Force Survey report 1987.

TABLE (II) Distribution of Women In the Paid Labour Force 1987

(showing horizontal segregation.)

Sources: Table 4.6 and 4.7 Blackwell ’89 p.32 & 33

Horizontal Segregation

Horizontal segregation is the term used to describe the concentration of women in a limited number of employment sectors. This is found to be a major characteristic of all labour markets. It means that we can refer to women’s jobs and men’s jobs as two distinct categories. Women are concentrated into three main areas, clerical workers, professional workers and service workers. The modal category of female employment has been clerical work in which there was a steady increase until 1986 when 28% of employed women worked in clerical jobs. However, with job losses in 1987 this proportion was reduced to 27%. 25% of women work in professional and technical areas, an area which expanded steadily since the seventies.

Women are concentrated in the lower professions such as nursing and teaching, but there has been an increase in the numbers of women working as doctors, pharmacists and as members of the legal profession. Third level figures show that increasingly women are entering ’non-traditional areas of study with the sole exception of engineering which still remains a male bastion. (Clancy ’88 p.17) 15% of women work in the services sector which includes jobs as cleaners, maids and canteen workers. Many of the jobs in this area are badly paid and there has been a tendency to convert this work into part-time jobs with attendant disadvantages. 70% of part-time workers are women.

Vertical Segregation

Even in areas where women dominate they are confined to the lower grades, the most glaring examples of which are the Civil Service and the teaching profession. While women make up 38% of the total General Service grades, they are concentrated in the two lowest grades, with declining representation as one moves up the grade structure, to a total absence of women from the two top grades, as the Table 1 (chapter three p.21) shows.

Michael Ross in his study of Employment in the Public Domain (Ross ESRI Report 127) explained this in two ways: firstly women tended to apply for clerical and typing jobs rather than executive jobs, even if qualified for the latter. It is easier to get promoted from the latter while the former are considered dead end jobs. Secondly, after ten years of employment, 75% of women had left, usually to raise a family. A third explanation is that women are likely to be discriminated against in the recruitment and promotional procedures. In an attempt to address the latter issue, and as part of EC policy an Equal Opportunities Policy which gives guidelines to ensure equal treatment was initiated in the Civil Service in 1986.

European Patterns

In all European countries there has been an increase in the participation of women in the labour force due to (1) a lowering of the birth rate, (2) social and legislative changes which see women as having a right to work and (3) economic necessity in countries where one wage is inadequate to sustain a family. However, there is still considerable variation in the participation of women in the labour force. Although family size has an impact on women’s employment rates in all countries, the size of the impact varies according to Moss’s European study of chilcare and equality of opportunity. The provision of maternal leave, childcare facilities and assistance to women in the home varies extensively also. (Moss ’88)

Proportion of Mothers who Participate In the Labour Force

Overall, the statistics concentrate on the participation rate of women aged between 15-60 in the workforce, rather than on participation rate of mothers per se. Usually one deduces that a low participation rate of women in general is explained in terms of the low participation rate of married women and mothers. The definition of ’work’ also varies. Sometimes this implies full-time work, sometimes part-time work. For instance where Swedish figures show that 80% of women work, further analysis reveals that 80% of mothers work part-time. The following overview shows the interaction between social and economic factors in women’s employment in a number of European countries.

Finland

In Finland, where the workplace is the expected place for women, 77% of mothers with children up to six years old are gainfully employed. During the eighties as a result of an increase in unemployment, Finland introduced a home support care model to encourage greater child care within the home. The dominant work model meant that women could not and would not forgo their wages and remain at home to look after children. In 1978 maternity leave was extended from 8 months to 15 months and a maternity benefit was paid dependent on a previous salary of between 250-800 Finnish marks a month. This corresponded to about a fourth or a third of the average female wage and was paid only on condition that the child was cared for at home. It was subsequently extended until the child was aged two and was paid for each additional child until the youngest child was aged two. Under the extended scheme, the children could also be looked after by a grandmother. Many mothers who worked in low paid monotonous jobs availed of the scheme, which they felt also increased the status of being a housewife and mother, giving it due recognition. Larger families where mothers did not want to work benefited greatly from the home support system. There is however, no job guarantee for the parent who opts to stay at home under the Finish system. There is a paternity leave of 6-12 days, at the birth of child. More than 25% of fathers take this leave. Fathers can also take maternity/parental leave instead of the mother after she has taken her first 100 days leave. ( Erler et al. 1982)

Hungary

In Hungary the rate of participation of women in the workplace is 80%, this is explained in terms of a developing economy which needed women in the workplace and women’s desire for an adequate standard of living. Child care became an issue in the late sixties. In 1967 GYES, Hungarian maternity leave was introduced. Initially, it was a three year leave for mothers with maternity benefits which amounted to between 1/4 and 1/3 of the average female wages plus the guarantee of being able to return to the same job after leave. After the child is one year old, fathers can also take parental leave and more recently parents were permitted to work up to four hours a day to supplement their parental leave benefits. Women are particularly happy about job guarantees and with their freedom to interrupt leave and return for a while to the workplace, if they so wish. Use of the full period of GYES varies by occupation: women in professions using less time than those in unskilled jobs. However many women return to work earlier as the GYES money is inadequate to maintain their standard of living and some women with highly qualified jobs don’t want to lose contact with the professional world. The provision of nurseries has been neglected which causes great distress in Hungary. There are no grand- mothers or neighbourhood groups to assist with childcare. Mothers are still expected to carry the double burden and many would like some kind of GYES when children start school.(Erler et al. p.3)

Sweden

80% of Swedish women are economically active and 80% of mothers work part-time. Parental insurance provides benefit for 7 months at childbirth, one month before and six months afterwards. The six months can be taken by both parents giving a total post-natal leave of 360 days, an option which encourages shared responsibility in bringing up children. Payment is 90% of shared income for the first 270 days and a low flat rate thereafter.

These days can be taken at any time up to when the child is eight years old. While leave is transferable few fathers take advantage of it; only 7% take the first six months leave and then only 2% of the time available. One third of fathers participate in the special parental leave, but take only 13% of the time available, 73% of the special leave is transferred to mothers.

Parents can also opt to spread this leave over time i.e. 90 full days or 180 half days or 360 quarter days. Parental and part-time work is intertwined. Part time work is protected under the social service system and for women it means the best of both worlds. While the intention of the legislation has been to consider it appropriate for men to stay at home and care for children, the practice has been for women to mother. Parents with children under the compulsory school age are entitled to a six hour working day but without compensation for loss of earnings. (Erler et al. p.7-10)

West Germany, German Federal Republic

Germany has a low rate of participation of women in the labour force. The rate of participation of mothers of children under 18 is 44%. Migrant foreign labour rather than a female labour force is used, in times of labour shortages.

Maternity leave was introduced in 1979 and can be taken 6 weeks before the child is due and for 8 weeks afterwards during which time the mother is paid full wages. It can then be continued until the child is 6 months old during which time mothers receive 50-70% of the average net wages of women workers. During this time their jobs are guaranteed and they are covered by social security. 95% of mothers avail of maternity leave with only 2% taking less time than is on offer, 51% then remain at home while the remainder return to work. (Erler et al. ’82) Parents in the public sector can work part-time for up to six years if they have a child under 18.

Austria

Maternity leave was introduced in Austria in 1957, giving 1/2 a year without pay. Now it extends to one year, the job is guaranteed and 3,200 shillings per month is paid. Public childcare is hard to find so many mothers remain at home while children are small, sometimes having a second child before their maternity leave expires. Children and childcare interrupts their employment activity but they are all determined to work again afterwards. There is a ready supply of available work for them. The lack of a longer maternity benefit system and the favourable assistance given to single mothers - an emergency assistance for three years which is better than maternity benefits - encourages some women not to marry until the child is three years old. 16% of mothers now claim the latter maternity benefit.

Denmark

Denmark has the highest employment rate of mothers (75%) with children under 5 in the EC. Over 80% of mothers are in the labour force. Most women remain in continuous employment except for maternity leave. They approach the ‘male norm’. They have 14 weeks maternity leave with 90% of pay, followed by 2 and a half months parental leave with 90% pay up to a maximum level.( Moss p. 59)

France

France has an employment rate of 50% for mothers with children under 5. A study in 1981 showed that over a third of mothers with one child under 16 remained in employment. They have 10 weeks maternity leave with 90% of pay for the first child. This is extended to 18 weeks for the third and additional children. They can also take parental leave for 33 months but this is without pay unless it is the third child and a flat rate of pay 2400ff per month is paid. Parents have also got the option of working a shorter day i.e. 50-90% of normal working hours. (Moss p. 58)

England

Only 3% of mothers in England remain in the labour market continuously throughout their child bearing years. Only 22% of mothers with 3 or more children are employed as compared with 45% with one child. The statutory provision of maternity leave is the lowest in Europe, with 6 weeks at 90% of earnings and 12 weeks at a flat rate. There is no provision for parental leave. Recently, structured part-time employment has been introduced in the Civil Service and job-sharing is available in local authorities.(Moss p. 58)

Greece

Greece permits eleven weeks paid maternity leave at 100% of earnings. An unpaid parental leave of three months per parent or six months for single parents is allowed. (Moss p. 59) Approximatley 40% of mothers are in the labour force. (Moss p. 16)

Spain

In Spain fourteen maternity weeks can be taken before or after birth, as preferred, at 75% of earnings. There is no formal paid parental leave though employees can take a three year break with preferential treatment when they apply for re-instatement.(Moss p.59) Employment rates for mothers with children under 6, were reported to be under 25%. (Moss p.11)

Italy

Italy permits 12 weeks maternity leave at 80% of earnings, six months parental leave is permitted after maternity leave, which is transferable to fathers at 30% of earnings.(Moss p. 58) Employment rates for mothers with children under five are in the 30-39% range in Italy. (Moss p.11)

Ireland

Ireland has the lowest employment rate for mothers with children under 5, less than 20% of whom work. (Moss fig.2.1 p. 12) The higher the number of children, the lower the participation rate. Only 12% of mothers with 3 or more children under 10 are employed.(Moss ’88 p.43) Ireland has 14 weeks maternity leave with 70% of earnings, workers may in addition take four weeks unpaid leave. There is no parental leave but a career break scheme in the public sector is available for domestic purposes and is in practice used by mothers as a form of parental leave. In addition job-sharing is available in the Civil Service and in a small number of State sponsored companies.

Leave for Family Reasons

Even when parents have creche facilities and continue to work, problems can arise if children get sick. Leave for family purposes has been requested in many countries. Six countries have leave for the care of sick children.

Italy allows time off for care of sick children on production of a doctor’s certificate. In Greece in the case of child sickness, parents can take 6 days off per year if they have one child, 8 for two children and 10 for three children. In Germany parents are allowed 5 days leave (for child illnesses) per year and in Spain leave for the first two days of a child’s sickness; in Denmark parents can take the first day of child’s sickness off. This leave is however paid leave only in Denmark and in Germany. In Spain in the Public Sector, leave for sick children is treated as personal sick leave. (P. Moss p. 67)

Child Care Costs

According to Peter Moss’s study on childcare, there are two forms of State subsidy, (1) supply subsidy and (2) demand subsidy. The former supports child care services directly, by the provision of childcare or by financially supporting private organisations. Demand subsidies increase resources parents have to spend on childcare by giving tax relief. Three countries give tax relief on child care costs: Netherlands, Luxemburg and France. The Netherlands give a tax allowance of f1,802 for working parents, the cost actually incurred are usually between f1,500 to f1,700. Luxemburg allows 18000 LSF in tax allowances on the production of a receipt for expenses incurred. France allows 10,000FF per year per child under 7 if both parents are working and the child is looked after outside the home. In all countries tax relief amounts to approximately half of actual costs incurred.

In addition, France, to encourage employment offers a cash grant to parents who formally employ a childminder, this covers the latter’s social insurance. Grants are also given to parents who give a child to a childminder to mind in her (childminder) own home. These measures are designed to integrate childminding into the formal economy.

Ireland offers no tax allowances for children or for childcare expenses. All mothers are paid a child allowance of £15 per month per child.

In terms of the provision of State childcare facilities for those under 3 years, Moss identified three country types: (1) High provision only found in Denmark which covered 45% of its children; middle provision (Belgium, France, Italy and Portugal) which had nurseries for 5-10% of children and the remainder of EEC countries including Ireland which provided care for less than 1% of its young children. (McKenna ’88 & Moss p.92) Many public funded nurseries give priority to children from working classes. This results in a reluctance on the part of the middle class parents to use them. However in areas of high provision such as Denmark publicly funded nurseries are widely used by middle and working class parents. The very high level of participation of Danish mothers in the labour force is thought to be directly related to high quality and extensive nursery facilities.

Variation in Participation

The actual participation rate of mothers varies from country to country, This may in part be explained by historical and social factors, economic development and childcare policies. Economic factors such as the demand for labour and the way in which such a demand is satisfied and the provision of childcare facilities have been identified as a primary factor in explaining the participation rate of women in the labour force.

For example, most socialist countries needed women workers to help develop and build their economies and so one finds high levels of female participation in the labour force. Finland and Iceland also wanted labour and recruited women. On the other hand Germany had a labour shortage, and a tradition of women in the home and so chose to satisfy her requirements by using migrant labour. The latter in addition to German high salaries explains the low participation of women in the paid labour force. The high cost of living and the expectations of a high standard of living in Sweden has encouraged women into the labour force as two salaries are deemed necessary for an adequate life-style. Ireland, in contrast, has never had a labour shortage and so there is no economic pressure to facilitate women’s entry and retention in the labour force.

Equality Legislation

Over time as the participation of women in the labour force increased and as women campaigned for the right to equal pay and equal opportunity, all countries introduced some form of equality legislation. The latter per se only facilitates the fair recruitment of, and employment of women, it does not guarantee it.

In terms of the male ‘norm’ a working life is seen as ideally continuous and on-going, career oriented with promotion on seniority. Women with children have been unable to have such a pattern of work. With the entry of women into the paid labour force facilitating legislation had to be introduced, permitting them to return to work after maternity leave and to ensure that they were compensated financially for such leave, albeit paid for by their PRSI contributions.

Equality initially centres on the equal treatment of men and women in the labour force: equal pay and equal treatment in accordance with EC directives. More recently the emphasis on equal opportunities has centred on new initiatives: parental leave i.e. additional paid or unpaid leave which can be taken by either parent of young children; the facility of reducing hours worked per day for an interim period (structured part-time or job-sharing) and flexitime. All were devised to facilitate parents who wished to work but also have time with their children. Equally important was the provision of childcare facilities either creches, nurseries, and after-school care or of tax incentives to parents for childcare expenditure. As we have seen, the introduction and development of such arrangements has been uneven in Europe.

All policy discussions on these issues have been faced with a dilemma. If women are granted more leave and greater ease in the combination of work and childcare, then they will remain responsible for it and in turn society will continue to see children as the responsibility of women. This approach will, it is feared marginalise women. Yet if some flexibility is not sought there is a danger that women will not continue to work after childbirth and be subsequently forced out of the labour force, never to return the latter is the traditional pattern which persists in Ireland.

There are two alternative solutions to the problem. The first is to encourage parenting. This option which is being vigorously pursued by Sweden seeks to encourage fathers to take equal responsibility for children. This would make ’parenting’ a more central concept than mothering. In time it should also change the present ’male norm’ working life. Progress on the latter front is still very slow. The reasons advanced for the reluctance of men to take ’parental’ leave are that (1) women are more likely to take leave because they earn less, and (2) men are less likely to want to take leave.

The second solution is the introduction of State supported nurseries and in that way increase society’s responsibility for childcare. If nurseries were available both parents would be free to work as their children are cared for in nurseries. This is the emergent Danish model.

The present EC medium term plan on equal opportunities action for women has emphasised the necessity to distribute the domestic burden in the home and in that way facilitate the full incorporation of women into the workplace.

CHAPTER TWO

Motherhood, Work and Equal Opportunities Policy

The object of this research is to depict and analyse the parameters within which mothers make decisions about participation in the labour market; the factors which explain variation in participation and the impact of equal opportunity policies and practices in facilitating their decisions.

The Civil service is an ideal case study for this research for the following reasons: It has:

(1) full-time, permanent pensionable posts,

(2) a promotional structure, which facilitates women with a career orientation and

(3) it has adopted an equal opportunities programme.

As regards combining work and family life, three outcomes regarding participation are predicted :

(1) Full time continuous work.

(2) A career break to enable women to look after children at home.

(3) The option of job-sharing, enabling women to combine work and family.

This chapter reviews research on motherhood and work. In addition it seeks to describe the relationship between equal opportunity initiatives and the retention or withdrawal of women from the labour force.

Factors which Explain Variation in Participation

Given the changing position of women and work, some research has attempted to find the factors which explain variation between women as regards combining work and motherhood.

Overall, American research has shown, (1) the older the children, the more likely mothers were to work, (2) wives’ participation in the labour market decreased as husbands’ incomes rose and (3) the participation rate of women increased according to educational level - those with post-graduate education having higher levels of participation. However, when highly educated women with young children were examined, it was found that they were inhibited from working. (Hoffman & Nye’79)

As regards motivation for employment, most working women cite financial reasons, although this might be to avoid social sanctions. (It is interesting to note that few men are asked this question!). More specific responses were found by Carmichael (’80) e.g. 43% were working to supplement family income; 27% for income for themselves; 19% to support their families and 14% wanted something interesting to do. When asked whether they would continue to work if they had no financial need to, 50% said they would continue to work to avoid boredom.

A study conducted by Behrman (’82) based on women’s intention to work after childbirth, identified three discrete groups each with distinctive characteristics: (1) those who intended to work full-time, (2) those who worked part-time and (3) those who intended to stay at home. I will elaborate on these topologies.

(1) Full-time Working Mothers

They had higher incomes, higher educational levels and earned a higher proportion of their family incomes than other 2 groups, i.e. 46% of family income as compared with 35% for part-time workers and 31% for full-time home makers (when they were in paid labour force). They were in more prestigious jobs and they intended after motherhood to hire child care services. All of the sample attached great importance to their child’s needs so this factor did not show variation in their plans to work. Women who intended to work full-time did not find this incompatible with their perceived children’s needs. Career considerations, career achievement and personal satisfaction were more important for this group than for the others. While they were definite about their plans to continue to work full-time, they were less comfortable about them than the other two groups were. Their choice was a compromise. Their husbands were very supportive about their wives plans to work, having more egalitarian attitudes towards sex-roles than husbands of home-makers.

They rated financial considerations as being most important, these being more important for the wives in question than for their husbands. Their husbands ranked wives’ needs very highly. This group of women were willing to share domestic roles but all women were less inclined to share child-care, men in general being more in favour of equal childcare than women were. In sum, this group of women and their husbands believed in their ability to combine family and work responsibilities.

(2) Full-time Homemakers

Among these women the needs of the child took priority, which for them meant they could only be properly cared for by their mothers. They felt it important for women to remain at home, believing a woman who works full-time cannot be as good a mother as one who doesn’t. Full-time homemakers had completed their formal education earlier than full-time working mothers and their salaries prior to their leaving the workforce had contributed a smaller proportion of total family income, than the salaries of full time working mothers did to their family incomes. Hence financial pressures to work may not have been as great. They did however hold more traditional values which were shared by their husbands, believing that their family or the children came first. Their husbands also differed in that they considered their career roles were more important than their family role. They rated the home roles of their wives as even more important than their wives did.

(3) Part-time Workers

The third group, part-time workers were more difficult to characterise. Their decisions were based on a combination of their children’s needs, financial considerations and their own needs. In their case, the husbands were more likely to look after the children when they worked. Behrman’s study does suggest a typology in orientations to mothering together with salience of economic contribution made by mothers towards family incomes to explain variation in participation in the full-time labour force.

Another study by Gerson looked at the decisions in a more long-term perspective. She wanted to find out whether there was any interaction between decisions to continue or return to work and mothers’ experiences in the work-place. She found that neither a structural/coercive approach nor a socialisation approach explained variation in women’s choice. The structural coercive approach stresses the way in which social institutions created and controlled by men shape women’s options and thus coerce their behaviour: women’s behaviour results from male domination. (Gerson ’85 p.24). The socialisation approach focuses on the processes by which female and male personalities are created, as children internalise the capacities, values and motivations appropriate to their gender roles.

Instead she put forward a developmental approach. This examines the way people’s motives, goals and capacities develop as they move through a series of life stages, and confront a series of choices in which they must make consecutive life commitments. (Gerson ’85 p37) Women unlike men, were often presented with the dilemma of packaged choices, in which they had to decide between a domestic and a public sphere. She concluded that four factors in the social environment made a difference.

1. A stable relationship with a male partner and this partner’s orientation towards rearing and bearing children promoted domesticity in a number of ways.

’It fostered a belief in marriage as a safe, secure place that both permits and rewards economic dependency; over time, it tended to narrow a woman’s occupational options, as wives’ decisions were subordinated to those of their spouses; and ultimately offered an attractive alternative to un-satisfying work-place experiences. Similarly, a stable marriage promoted a context in which child-bearing came to be seen as a natural outgrowth of the relationship itself’. (Gerson, 1985, p.2)

Bearing children and rearing them seemed natural, inevitable and desirable.

2. In the public sphere, blocked versus expanding work-place opportunities had an impact on respondents’ choices. Constricted work opportunities pushed them out of work, with domesticity and motherhood becoming preferred alternatives. In contrast, expanding work-place opportunity, unexpected promotion and the promise of a career ladder reinforced work/career choice. Work provided another source of personal identity and social reward and thereby raised the cost of motherhood.

3. When spouses were able to provide an adequate income, women were not pushed out of the home and away from domesticity. They were free to stay at home and be ’sheltered from exposure to unexpected work opportunities’. Economic squeezes, by contrast, pulled them into the labour force delaying childbearing or limiting the number of children.

4. For others the perceived rewards of domestic life-style were unrealised or disappointing. Their isolation and the devaluation of mothering was too costly and this encouraged a return to work. Gerson’s model is useful in that it provides us with a dialectical approach to the issue.

Conclusion from Research Analysed

This review shows the way in which contemporary women make decisions about participation in the labour force. There are two polarised roles to choose between: full-time mother or a full-time paid worker and a third compromised role of part-time paid worker.

Three kinds of variables influence women’s decisions in this matter:

(1)personal factors i.e. educational level, income, orientation to work, attitude to child-care;

(2)spousal factors such as husbands orientation to career, attitude to childcare and

(3)work based experiences which act as pull or push factors, enticing them to remain at work or withdraw to home. At the individual level there will be considerable interaction between these variables in determining which decision a woman takes. Part-time work is a third decision which saves women from having to take either polarised choice.

Equal Opportunities Policies

Equal Opportunities policies were designed to ensure the equal treatment of women in the work-place: One would anticipate that equal opportunities factors should improve the experiences of women at work and in that way serve to increase the attraction of full-time work.

Feminism and Liberal Policy

A liberal conception of equal opportunities was initiated by liberal feminists who wished to advance women’s rights in the work-place. Liberal Equal Rights feminism stated that women and men were equal i.e. anything that men can do in the public world women can also do. To enable women to fully develop their human potential entry into the public world was seen as desirable. (Freidan ’63, de Beauvoir’49). Discriminatory laws and institutions prevented women from entering this public world, women therefore failed to reach their full potential and so the laws had to be changed. Freidan’s identification of the ’problem with no name’ mobilised women into the public sphere and into career orientated work. This form of feminism was pejoratively called ’bourgeois’ feminism and career feminism. (Tuttle ’87)

European Equal Rights Policies

European Policies on Equal Opportunities have been dominated by a liberal policy model as opposed to a radical policy. This principle is part of the liberal classical tradition, an extension of the idea of securing equal liberties for all persons. It demands that in recruitment and promotional systems fair selection procedures which would ignore sex, race or social status and would instead concentrate on relevant qualifications be devised.

However, many selection systems designed to be non-discriminatory produced results which were still unequal in two respects. (O’Neill’85) Firstly, they produced societies whose members were extremely unequal in educational and occupational attainment. Secondly, even with the implementation of a liberal policy, the outcome showed disproportionate success for some social groups and disproportionate failure in others. The first result is not a problem for liberals as they assume that all cannot succeed and so there must be successes and failures - rationally chosen. The second result is a problem in that it raises a suspicion that selection procedures might not as yet have been devised that were truly non-discriminatory, that for instance ’promotions are often made on criteria other than on the job performance’ (O’Neill’85). This would still reflect their concern with procedures rather than outcomes.

Formal Equality

Philosophically two interpretations of liberal equal opportunities have been formulated: one formal and one substantive. (O’Neill’85) Formal equal opportunity as interpreted sees two persons A and B as having equal opportunities in some respect if neither faces a legal or quasi-legal obstacle in doing something which the other does not face. Or as Jencks put it ‘that the rules determining who succeeds and who fails should be fair’. (Jencks’72 p.3)

Substantive Equality

A substantive interpretation of the concept of equal opportunity is more exacting. O’Neill cites a lottery where the same proportion of all kinds of people can win as an example of substantive or actuarial equality of opportunity.

‘On this view, opportunities for A and B with respect to x are to be regarded as equal not because neither faces legal or quasi-legal obstacles which the other does not face, but because they belong to social groups whose rates of success at obtaining x are equal’.

An equal opportunity society from the substantive position is one in which the success rates of all major social groups are the same. From this viewpoint, preferential or quota admissions and hirings are justifiable because they confer equal rewards, not because they apply standards in an non-discriminatory way. On this view, women would be selected on the basis of the proportion of women applicants. Substantive equal opportunity is achieved when the success rates of certain major social groups are equalised.

This policy becomes threatening only when a scarce and desirable occupation is at issue. Objections to the policy are raised by members who are disproportionately successful under a mode of selection compatible with a formal interpretation. In opposing substantive equality it has been argued that it might lead to less competent performances and that as such it would be unjust and inefficient.

In response to these charges advocates of substantial equality claim that the price in efficiency will be low since the relevance of job qualifications to job performance is often meagre and that in most cases people learn on the job. While some concede that an injustice might be done to those who are passed over, in the long run it will reduce overall discrimination and the need for preferential treatment will be eliminated. There are liberal and radical or weak and strong applications of preferential hiring. The former proposes that if he or she is the best candidate or equally qualified for the job as the other candidate, the minority candidate ought to be hired. A stronger system holds that if the minority candidate is at least minimally qualified for the job, they ought to be hired.

One question which can be initially posed then is whether a formal or substantive definition of equal opportunity might be preferable in furthering women’s rights.

Jenson and Mason writing on the development of equal opportunities in the work-place claim that the liberal formal model assumes that ‘all individuals are enabled freely and equally to compete for social rewards’. To facilitate this any unfair distortions in the operation of the labour market must be removed. Selection must be on the basis of individual meritocratic characteristics to the neglect of any structural or collective barriers. Once therefore legal or social prohibitions are removed which excluded certain groups, all individuals compete as individuals. In the case of women, for instance, the removal of the marriage bar would be a liberal requirement to ensure fair procedures and enable women to compete with men.

The Implementation of Equality

There are difficulties with the implementation of the liberal dictates. Some evidence suggests that the formal meritocratic procedures on which the liberal policy works can be subverted by for instance writing job descriptions in a way which will render some applicants - the minority ones - unsuited. Favoured applicants can in practice have a job description designed for themselves. This can be done by specifying certain kinds of experience or expertise (which the favoured applicant has) but which will exclude other applicants. Formal liberal ’fair’ policies can perpetuate the status quo. In other cases, jobs do not require extensive skills or knowledge and so ’acceptability’ rather than suitability is used to select candidates; ’aspects of masculinity and femininity can become established as indicators of suitability’ (Webb and Liff ’88). This has resulted in gendered jobs (Davies’88; Webb’88)

In other examples job demands and individual characteristics defy specific categorisation. Patricia Waters’ research of British Civil Service Principals’ perceptions of male and female abilities revealed that when compared in terms of a list of specific characteristics men and women were judged to be closely similar in nearly all characteristics. Yet women were found to be different in two respects:

(1) They were considered less stable and less likely to be highly dependable, and (2) fewer women as compared with men were judged capable of functioning in posts beyond the level of assistant Secretary. When it came to ’overall style’ and approach, women were judged to be lacking when compared with men. In practice a male organisational style dominates organisations to the disadvantage of aspiring women. This lack of belief in women means that :

’Women have to prove clearly that they are successful, whereas men are assumed to be successful until they conclusively demonstrate that they are failures’. (Fogarty, Allen, Walters 1981 p.44)

These examples show the possible limitations and abuses of a liberal policy. One could purport to have a “fair” selection system but its effects would be minimal. A substantive policy would preclude such deviance. There is however a link between both in that in the assessment of the implementation of an equal opportunities policy, the substantive criterion is often used. All things being equal, one expects at least a proportionate representation in success rates of both male and female candidates , which while not resulting in full equality in terms of outcome, results in proportionate equality in outcome. This is a minimal criterion which does not entail any preferentail treatment of minority candidates.

In the next section the position of women in the Civil Service will be examined and the initial impact of the Equal opportunities policy will be assessed.

CHAPTER THREE

Equal Opportunities, Policy, Recruitment and Promotional Structures in the Irish Civil Service

Irish Civil Service: The Traditional Legacy

Civil Servants have in the past shared a traditional view of the role of women in society and this attitude has been documented in a report on the Civil service in 1935. The Brennan Report on the Civil Service expressed the view that ’when all relevant aspects are taken into account the woman does not give as good a return of work as the man’ (Par 180). This sentence in the report was not based on documented evidence but rather on ’general expressions of opinions which we have heard’, Contradicting this belief, one assistant secretary queried why if that was the case no woman was ever found on probation to be unfit for work. Despite his objections and the fact that there was three dissenters that sentence remained in the report. This epitomises the traditional legacy within which the Civil Service had to operate. Its present day impact will, of course, vary from department to department. Irish society in general has still comparatively conservative attitudes towards women in the labour force and one would expect that such views are equally shared by Civil Servants. (Women in Europe 1987).

Women in the Civil Service

The distribution of grades in the Civil Service shows extensive vertical segregation. This was the focus of a number of articles in the Civil Service publication, Seirbhis Phoibli in 1984 and ’85. In the original articles the issue which received most attention was that of vertical segregation: women were concentrated in the lower grades and few women were in positions of power. Promotional opportunities for women were seen as being less than for men. The existence of the marriage bar was advanced as one explanation for this imbalance. However, with its abolition in 1974, positive change was expected. While discrimination in recruitment was not a major focus, there were suggestions that in the competition for Third Secretary in Foreign Affairs, women might have been discriminated against.

These articles coupled with publicity on same from the Employment Equality Agency plus earlier pressure from the then Ministry of Women’s Affairs and EC Directives on the position of women in Public Sector employment all paved the way for the formulation of an Equal Opportunities Policy for the Irish Civil Service.

The Policy

The policy and guidelines are published in a little white booklet which was distributed to senior management in all departments. The Guidelines were drawn up in agreement with staff interests and in consultation with the Employment Equality Agency in July 1986. The Policy in practice emphasises that all Civil Servants must be treated equally and that one’s sex should not be a discriminating factor in the recruitment or promotion of employees. It also points out that career breaks are available for domestic reasons and that job-sharing was being introduced to facilitate the combination of family and work.

It does not establish or put in place any strategies for achieving equal opportunities nor does it specify any goals. There were no centrally organised seminars to announce the policy nor was the actual document itself distributed to all staff. One positive aspect of its introduction was the setting up of a General Council Subcommittee on Equality in 1986. They have responsibility for monitoring the Equal Opportunitities Policy and they issued a first progress report on the year 1987, published in 1988. When first introduced Equal Opportunities Policy within the Service was the responsibility of the Dept. of the Public Service but one of the first impacts of the cuts in the Public Sector was the elimination of this Dept Responsibility for Equal Opportunities is now the responsibility of the Equality Section in the Department of Finance.

Implementation and Progress

Given that this policy is one of individualistic liberalism, how does one assess its impact. One criterion used is that of proportional substantive representation. (O’Neill”85) This is used in affirmative action policies in the States. According to this criterion if equal number of male and female candidates apply and are deemed eligible for particular posts, one will expect male/females to have similar rates of success if that is not the outcome, in the American case the company might be asked to show that the outcome is not due to discrimination. In the analysis of statistical data which follow the proportional substantive criterion is used. The latter is being implicitly used by the Civil Service themselves. It was also used to pursue a case of discrimination by a group of civil servants. This review will be based on statistics published in the first annual report on the implementation of the Equal Opportunity in 1988.

Recruitment Procedures

(a) Non graduates

Civil Servants are recruited on the basis of open competitions organised by the Civil Service Appointments Commission. Candidates are ranked on the basis of performance and are placed on a ’panel’. As vacancies arise, they are offered to suitable candidates, in order of merit. There is a two tier system in operation. One tier recruits school leavers for Clerical Assistants and Clerk Typists (CA and CA - typist), Clerical Officers (CO) and Executive Officers (EO). Traditionally the latter were drawn from students with good Leaving Certificate results, who qualified for University but opted for employment. In the case of CA’s and CO’s formal written examinations were used and included Irish, Maths and English officially described as intermediate standard or probably Pass Leaving certificate. The EO’s are recruited on the basis of the Leaving Certificate results and a written general knowledge test. The actual standard of entrant depended on the numbers actually recruited, in times of rapid expansion candidates who had been placed in lower orders of merit would be called whereas if only a small number were called they were from the top of the ranked list. A Report of the Joint Management Staff Working party recommended post entry education as an incentive to attract able school leavers. The Dept of Finance offered 5 scholarships to EO’s. The E.O competition was also then extended to graduates by raising the age limit, though the open competition did not in effect yield a high proportion of graduates. Because the E.O. is also a promotional grade from C.O., the Unions, in seeking to protect their promotional opportunities agreed an internal confined competition for every open competition.

(b) graduate entry

The second entry level is for graduates who are recruited as Administrative Officers, a grade on a par with the internal promotional grade Higher Executive Officer. Graduates can have a faster track and some cohorts in the past were guaranteed promotion after seven years to Assistant Principal.

In the sixties and seventies, with an increase in educational levels generally, the Civil Service encouraged its staff to take degrees in Public Administration to satisfy that need. A diploma could also be taken from the Institute of Public Administration by correspondence. In theory there is not a degree bar and it is possible for officers in general service grades to be promoted without a degree. No recent information is available on educational levels. The Devlin Report showed that half of the Assistant Principals had diplomas or degrees. One would expect an increase in that proportion over time.

Prerequisites for Promotion

Eligibility for promotion must be cleared prior to attempting promotion. Very little is written on this but basically it means that your personnel records are checked i.e. your absences, sick leave and the number of times a staff member was late are taken into account and, if unsatisfactory, the applicant can be considered ineligible for promotion.

Mobility Issues

Many competitions are open, if one competes and is successful in a CO competition, one could be offered a post in any department, which might mean that your actual place of work would change, with all the ensuing problems of mobility and travel arrangements. Internal departmental promotion is therefore very different from open promotion. Occasionally success in an open competition can result in internal promotion. Because most Civil servants work in Dublin, relocation due to promotion is likely to be in Dublin. For workers in Regional Offices ’down the country’, promotion would inevitably mean a move back to Dublin, very difficult to do for a small wage increase and with little chance of subsequent re-location to the country. Regional locations will not afford staff the same promotional opportunities as their Dublin based colleagues.

Promotion from the Lower Grades: Clerical Assistant to Clerical Officer

Promotion from CA to CO and from CO to EO is based on written examinations in Maths, English and Irish. Some of the competitions are open, some closed. There are 11 points on the CA scale with a maximum salary of £171.73 per week as compared with 15 points on the C.O. scale with a maximum of £215 per week. Passing the examination was no guarantee of promotion, one was ranked on the marks obtained in the exam on a panel and then had to await one’s call. In many cases the ’panel’ would expire after two years and if one had not been ’called’, but was still interested in promotion, one had to re-sit or repeat the same procedure.

Both recruitment and promotion opportunities vary from year to year and from cohort to cohort. The expansionist seventies produced greater career chances for those who entered in the late sixties and early seventies, but the subsequent embargo restricted opportunities. In partial recognition of the large numbers of clerical assistants who had not been promoted, a confined competition was held two years ago for ’the geriatrics’ as one respondent cheerfully called them.

Promotion: Middle Level

The next grade after C.O. is Staff Officer which forms an apex in the lower grades which has a maximum salary of £13,000 as compared with that of an E.O max of £14,000. In the sixties and seventies 60% of staff officers were women, probably representing the benefits of the expansionary years. The Staff Officer grade is usually one of internal departmental promotion, by interview. If it is by internal promotion there is no panel but one is assigned immediately. There are sometimes inter-departmental competitions but the result is often a panel which has to wait interminably for placement. In the past staff could be promoted from SO to EO. There were competitions for neither in 1986. Staff can be promoted from SO to EO by entering a confined competition. The latter is based on a written examination which is work related or on an interview or in some cases on a combination of both.

Promotional Opportunities for Typists

Typists are recruited as Clerical Assistants (Typist) or Clerk Typists. The highest grade they can achieve is that of Staff Officer (Supervisor of Typists) but there have been few such posts. They could get into the general grades by doing the C.O examinations, but as many like typing per se they remain as typists. Those who use word processors are given an additional allowance, but there seems to be considerable variation in what that is. Because of this allowance computers are delegated to individuals not offices. Some typists are eligible for a confidentiality allowance.

Promotion : The Higher Grades

Promotion to the highest grades is on the basis of internal departmental assessment and followed in some cases by interdepartmental peer evaluation or competitive interviews. There are variations between departments. Some having interviews, and others a form of peer evaluation. Peer and supervisor assessment depends on tasks undertaken and past achievements. In the interdepartmental stage of the competition you are nominated by your supervisor, i.e. Assistant Secretary, who in turn will have to present you and assess your superiority to those candidates being put forward by other Assistant Secretaries. Your chances in these competitions can be in your superiors hands and how much power they wield. In the past seniority almost guaranteed promotion, now some departments are re-assessing seniority versus merit criteria. The Public Sector embargo has also slowed down promotions.

The higher grades entail a lot of responsibility, many jobs involve working to constant deadlines with the ensuing problems of overtime. At the higher levels the Civil Service becomes a ’greedy’ institution which makes it more difficult to combine family and working life.

De-motion

De-motion is also possible as a form of punishment. One’s annual increments are based on the satisfactory performance of one’s duties. An employee’s salary may be reduced if there is evidence of a bad personnel record i.e. absenteeism or lack of punctuality. One respondent was demoted from the mid-point of her CO’s salary to the mid-point of a CA’s, and despite having subsequently cleared her record, was never re-instituted.

This overview shows the complexity of promotion and the consequent difficulties in assessing equality of opportunity. Ideally one needs a data base of staff which would give year of entry, type of work, competitions taken, and promotional successes including gender distribution. On the contrary there is no personnel data base, a factor which made this particular research difficult. The only data available were that presented in the report presented by the Equality committee on Equality of Opportunity in the Civil Service. The next section is based on the analysis of the latter report.

Distribution of Women in the Civil Service (General Service Grades)

For comparative purposes the following table gives the distribution of women in general Service grades in Jan 1983 and in October 1987.

TABLE 1

Percentage of Women in General Service Grades Jan 1983 and October 1987

Sources (1) Women in Ireland J. Tansey 1984 p.99

(2) Equality of Opportunity in the Civil Service 1988 p. 34

Recent Trends in Promotions: Top Level Appointments

The table reveals the absence of women from the top grade and the small representation of women in the Assistant Secretary and Principal Officer grades. An analysis of promotional competitions for Assistant Secretary and Dept. Secretary showed no women among those shortlisted. (Table 3 appendix report). This was explained by the fact that only 5% of Principal Officers are women. However an equal number of male and female candidates were eligible for the post of Chief Registrar (5 male and 5 female) in Dept. of Justice and one male was appointed and likewise women applied for specialist posts of Registrar and Solicitor but only males were appointed. As the report states: ’It is note worthy that more of the female candidates for the four specialist parts were successful.’(p.21)

Higher Grades

Table 1 shows a very slight increase in the proportion of women in Principal Officer (PO) and Assistant Principal (AP) grades with a decline in the proportion in Administrative Officer (AO) grades. In terms of vertical segregation in the Civil Service it has always been argued that it would take some years before the removal of the marriage bar had an impact on the representation of women in higher grades (Lenihan ’84 and Blackwell ’85) Some women have now broken that barrier. They include women with children so the 1987 figures are encouraging. The grades A.S., P.O., and A.P.O. are all promotional grades.

Women were also proportionately successful in interdepartmental confined interview competitions in 1987 for H.E.O and A.P posts (C/F table 2 appendix). At the middle management level there are unequal numbers of male and female candidates presenting for promotion but women are proportionately as successful as men and in some instances more successful.

Recruitment

Of some concern are the Administrative Officer figures which show a decline in the proportion of females. This is the graduate recruitment grade and has in the past been the “high flyer” grade. This figure could be explained in two ways. Firstly, in some competitions in the seventies graduates recruited as A.O’s were guaranteed promotion after seven years to A.P. level. This could in part explain higher representations of women at A.P. and a decline in the representation of women as A.O.’s which would indicate a positive gain for women. Secondly, it could also indicate that fewer women were recruited to the grade of Administrative Officer, a negative finding. Unfortunately a comparison of two tables does not give this information. Details of those promoted and recruited are required to assess the merits of the alternative explanations.

Further details are available on recruitment. The figures show that in 1987 there were a number of competitions for Administrative Officer and for A.O Finance (which is a higher grade A.O) and Third Secretary which is an equivalent position in the Dept. of Foreign Affairs.

An examination of these figures (table 4 appendix) suggests that women candidates performed disproportionately badly at the interview stage. In the competition for Third Secretary there was a success rate of 5% for women as compared with 31% for men. In the A.O (Higher Status) competition men had a success rate of 12% as compared with 4% for women: four men and one woman were appointed. In the competition for ordinary Administrative Officers, the success rate was 7% for women and 3% for men: three women and two men were appointed. Women were less successful when interviewed for the higher status posts.

Recruitment and Promotion: Lower Grades

The representation of women in the lower grades raises different issues. If equality measures are proceeding as planned, does one expect to find fewer women or might that simply lead to higher unemployment levels for women? The figures on recruitment reveal little change: women predominate in the lowest grades. In the typist grade 99% of applicants are women: of the 4268 women who applied 148 were appointed. This compares with 43 male applicants from which two were appointed. This gives success rate of 18% for males as compared with 13% for women.

In the clerical assistant competition two thirds of the applicants were women. Respective success rates at written examinations were similar (32% and 33%) while interview success rates were higher for women (39%) than for men (33%).

An examination of table 4 gives the results of an open competition for the higher grades of clerical officer. 60% of candidates were women. In the written stage of the competition the success rates were 38% for women and 28% for men. This advantage was reversed at the final interview stage for a place on panel: success rates were 2% for women and 9% for men. Examined in terms of numbers one finds a pool of 2597 women and 1326 men who were successful at the original written stage, but when it came to success at interview for a place on a panel the number placed were 36 women and 119 men. Using a substantive criterion this implies a lack of equal opportunity. This finding is further supported by the unequal success rates of female to male candidates in the confined competitions for clerical officer posts in the Central Statistics Office: 71% (male) as compared with 36% (female).

Interviews

These male female differences in interview success rates raise questions about possible discrimination against women at interviews, an accusation which is supported by evidence produced in a Labour Court case.

This case of discrimination was brought before the Labour Court by four women who felt that they had been discriminated against in an internal competition for promotion from clerical assistant (taxes) to the grade of Tax Officer. The Court proceedings are useful in illustrating the evaluation system used in making such appointments. Candidates were judged on:

Additional marks were awarded to candidates who had a record of proficiency in Irish. There were 654 candidates for the competition: 26% males and 74% females. The outcome was that 120 candidates were successful: 49 men and 71 women or approximately 29% of male applicants as compared with 15% of females. In the Cork district from where the complainants came, 73% of men were successful compared with only 7% of women.

Initially the applicants raised the case of discrimination against the Civil Service Commission. This was rejected so they asked their Union to pursue their case through the Labour Court, which the Union duly did. The applicants claimed that (1) the success rate of males interviewed by the Board D was much higher than the success rate of females (2) that each of the Complainants had received a more favourable assessment from their supervisors than at least eight of the eleven successful male candidates, (3) that the educational level and other qualifying attributes of the males would not have given them an advantage over the women and (4) that one female member of the interview board had demonstrated discriminatory attitudes towards female staff in the Cork staff office. As the Commissioners refused to give evidence which would counteract their allegations, the Equality Officer in the Labour Court recommended that on grounds 1-3, the women be placed on the panel. This ensured fair treatment but only for the complainants.

Limitations of Equality Legislation

Equality legislation it would appear can be quite ineffective unless it is used by the applicants. The Civil Service Commission and indeed the Sub-committee on Equality were of no assistance so the women had to proceed to the Labour Court. In this case the substantive procedure was used to support their case together with the fact that they were equal and even superior in qualifications to their male competitors. The Interview Board claimed in their defence that the interview was a major assessment instrument and that while they had noted the superior success of the male candidates, this was due to their objective interview performance and not because of favour on the part of the Board. However, as the latter were not prepared to be more explicit in their defence of the decision, their view was not upheld by the Labour Court. The accusation of prejudice against the woman on the Board was not upheld.

Conclusion

This examination of recruitment and promotion outcomes, using a substantive criterion indicates that inequalities still persist. The interim report produced by the Department of Finance in recognition of interview success differences, recommended training for those who serve on interview boards. The composition of interview boards (dominantly male) was also noted.

Using a substantive criterion of equal opportunity, this analysis shows that equality of opportunity does not exist in higher grades of the Civil Service. Specifically, this is the case in recruitment to Administrative officer (Higher Grade) posts, and to those of Third Secretary. Given the superior performance of women candidates in written examinations, it is difficult to explain their low success rates in interviews and appointments. Based on Walters British study of the high flyer nature of these grades it is likely that ‘acceptability’ is used as a criterion and women are judged less acceptable or suitable for the job. Women were judged as not capable of functioning in the higher level posts which initial recruitment to these grades would facilitate. Walters study of senior British Civil Servants is likely to be replicated here. A low recruitment of women to these posts now will in time mean the continuity of vertical segregation: their absence from the top level posts.

There is some equity to be seen in the promotion to the grades of Higher Executive Officer and Assistant Principal though this success is very small numerically.

The most glaring injustice appears in the Clerical Officer open competition where the disproportionate initial advantage of women is progressively eroded over the stages of the competition in favour of men. We need more data on selection and interview criteria to fully explain these differences. Using the substantive criteria, one has to agree that there is no equality for women aspiring to that grade. Interview data presented in the next chapter will give details of the processes whereby women are impeded in their promotional aspirations.

CHAPTER FOUR

Women in Lower Grades

The three lowest grades in the Civil service are Clerical Assistant, Clerical Assistant (Typist) and Clerical Officer. These are all female dominated grades (Table 1). The salary at the time of interview for clerical assistant ranged from a weekly wage of £116 to £171, while that of a Clerical Officer was from £119 to £215.

In his analysis of low pay Blackwell included these occupations among the low paid. (Blackwell 1987) He also described features of a secondary labour market which tended to accompany low pay. These were: higher than average turnover rates, little opportunity for on the job training, a lack of fringe benefits, poor promotional prospects and relatively little increase over time in real earnings. These sectors are also likely to be predominately female. School leaver studies show that over thirty per cent of females with leaving certificates enter clerical work.

Recruitment

An analysis of interviews shows that the majority of women in these positions took the initial Clerical Assistant or Clerical Officer examinations at school. Which examination they took depended on which competition was announced in the year they sat their Leaving Certificate. In a few cases women sat three examinations: CA, CO and EO and were ‘called’ to them in sequence. Women were encouraged to take the examinations by their teachers and to a lesser extent by their parents.

Working Life

The low salaries paid to women in the lower grades might well prompt the question: why do these women continue to work? There are a number of reasons.

(1)Financial necessity: the majority of married women in these grades are married to men in low social classes with low incomes, so that two incomes are necessary to maintain living standards especially if they are buying a home.

(2)Security of employment: many husbands are either self-employed or work in areas which don’t guarantee job security and in which their wages can vary over time. A few were unemployed. The mother’s income gave these families financial security.

(3)Lack of alternative employment: Clerical Assistants and Clerical Officers claim that they as civil servants are untrained for any other kind of work, the only alternative is work as sales assistants or factory work which are insecure and low paid.

(4)Orientation to work: fifty per cent of respondents said they enjoyed the intrinsic aspects of their work, while 28% emphasised the social aspects and twenty per cent the financial security of working.

Typists

Typists are recruited at Clerical Assistant (Typists) grade. It can afford a number of bonuses such as a confidentiality allowance, a word processing allowance and payment for overtime.

Negative Aspects of Work: New Technology

The introduction of word processing facilities brought about changes in the organisation of work. Typing has become centralised in typing pools. The outcome is a less personalised work environment.

‘I would like to go back to a smaller pool with more direct contact with the people you are working with’

The introduction of wordprocessors has been uneven, they are allocated to individuals not to departments, and those who work on them are allocated a special allowance.

Promotional Opportunities

Typists have few promotional opportunities as typists. Because they wish to remain typists the only promotional opportunity for them is to become a supervisor of typists. Some would not like that particular position.

‘I think I could have done the CO exam. I prefer typing to clerical or secretarial work. There was an SO typing competition but I wouldn’t like the supervisory work. They are very slow moving anyway. I saw the papers, they were stiff enough, anyway you would have to prepare for them. I’m happy where I am’.

‘I think I will stay at the same grade unless I get out and do some of the exams, and the longer you are out of school the harder it gets. I wouldn’t like to be a supervisor… you get into some awkward positions. I’m just happy the way I am, I love working on the computers.

Clerical Assistants

Clerical assistants are the most numerous grade in the Civil Service and seventy six per cent of them in 1988 were women. In 1988 there were 5,276 female clerical assistants out of a total of 14,784 staff in general service grades. (35%) Many clerical assistants described themselves as doing ‘all the work’, which was in turn just checked by the others.

‘We are the dog’s bodies… we do a lot of work for which we get little credit… the donkey work is done by us… credit taken by those above’. ‘We do all the work, the others only check it’.

This shows one the perceptions of those in the lowest grades. A high turnover in these grades in the past was explained in terms of the boring, tedious nature of the posts. (O’Broin & Farren’78) Many women left and moved into the private sector or left on marriage. Workers in this grade now include a number of married women who have worked as clerical assistants for years with no prospect of promotion.

Some respondents find this even more difficult to accept if they actually do the work or similar work to that of clerical officers. They have the ability to do the job. In practice they often actually do such work, in busy departments, when a clerical officer is on sick leave or on holidays.

The actual job content and workload of clerical assistant varies from department to department. Some have interesting tasks which they have complete responsibility for and this is satisfying, others have less autonomy and can find the work boring. Some are extremely busy while others enjoy an easier working life.

Promotional Structures

Open Competitions

Clerical assistants can take the open CO promotional competition. In the past this was based on the Leaving Certificate examination so it was desirable that one take the examination as soon as possible after entry or alternatively take some preparatory night classes. A knowledge of Irish was a considerable bonus. Among the respondents those who were successful had taken the examination quite soon after entry, had gone to night classes and studied in preparation for it.

Obstacles to Promotion:

(a) Ranked Position

However, passing the examination was not sufficient. One was then placed in rank order on a panel for subsequent promotion and as vacancies arose those on the panel were appointed. Your ranked number on this panel could be in the hundreds. One respondent was ranked at number 200 on a CO panel she had got on prior to the embargo, one hundred had been placed. Since the embargo, there had been no appointments from that panel.

(2) Expiry of Panel

A further obstacle to promotion was that the panel ‘expired’ after two years, so if you were not placed within that time you had to re-enter the competition and sit the examinations again, competing with a new cohort. Respondents rarely tried for a second time, believing that the nature of the examination gave recent school leavers greater chances of success. It is not surprising that women’s promotional ambitions were quickly ‘cooled out’ by this system.

(3) Entry Requirements: Seniority and Personnel Records

There were from time to time confined examinations, but in the past the examinations were still based on Irish, English and Mathematics. To enter this competition your records had to be clear and you had to have completed six years of service. Four respondents had been prevented from going forward for promotion due to poor records. In two cases leave due to illness was the reason given. Management claimed that the number of days leave was over the permitted sick leave period. One of these respondents successfully challenged this decision and was allowed to proceed. The second woman was unaware that she had not been permitted to proceed until other competitors were called to interview. It was too late for her to enter then. For the two others it was a question of punctuality: they were late in to work ‘on an unacceptable number of occasions’.

(4) Mobility

Some promotions necessitated a change of work location, sometimes to different parts of Dublin, sometimes back to Dublin and sometimes down the country. For workers in regional centres, promotion to the position of clerical officer would inevitably mean a move to Dublin, a move which was difficult to justify for a small wage increase. Others who had to avail of public transport in Dublin, wished to work in offices near their train or dart station.

(5) The Embargo

In the last few years there were some changes made. One competition was held for Clerical officers which was based on a new type of examination which was more work related. This was more appropriate, though candidates were unable to prepare as they did not know what kind of examination it would be. There was also a competition for ‘geriatrics’ as one respondent described them, e.g. for workers who had served over ten years as Clerical Assistants. She had duly been placed on a panel, but she had since heard that nobody had been appointed from that panel. The embargo has had a negative effect on promotions in recent years and those in the lowest grades were most seriously affected.

(6) Study Time

Childcare restricts the time full-time working mothers have for study purposes. Those who studied for exams did so prior to getting married and having children.

Promotional Rates

Among the thirty six respondents from the lower grades interviewed in the course of this study, 27 or 75% had not been promoted since entry. Eighty six per cent of them were over twenty five years of age and fifty per cent over thirty. Fifty six per cent had between twelve and nineteen years service. Four of the thirty six had entered as clerical officers, twenty as clerical assistants and twelve as typists. Overall, nine had been promoted from Clerical Assistant to Clerical Officer. This highlights the way in which low paid married women workers can become an underclass in the system. From the departmental returns (limited as they are) (c/f Table...) the profile of married women which emerges suggests a predominance of women in the clerical assistant grades. This horizontal segregation is particularly acute in one regional area, a situation which would probably be replicated if data from other regional offices was available.

Perceptions of Discrimination

To find out to what extent women perceived any discrimination respondents were asked whether they felt women had the same chances of promotion as men. Forty two per cent of respondents said yes, women had the same chances of promotion as men, while 56% disagreed. The remainder were undecided.

Married Women’s Interest in Promotion

When asked whether they thought that married women were interested in promotion 61% agreed that they were as compared with 40% who disagreed. Lower interest levels in promotion were explained in terms of the difficulties women with children experience in trying to cope with everything. They were more likely to get into a ‘rut’ and working one’s way out of such a rut was extremely difficult.

‘A lot of women don’t push themselves… when the examinations came up a lot of women could not be bothered… they get into a bit of a rut… they don’t look at their careers in the long term… it is more difficult for women with children’.

Children

Seventeen respondents had one child, seventeen had two children while two had three children. All had very young families: ninety one per cent of these respondents had children under eight years old.

Attitudes towards Married Women

Some respondents complained that negative attitudes towards women were expressed in comments made by their colleagues. These were more likely to come from single male colleagues and from some single women.

‘There’s an attitude now… oh! she’s going to have a baby, or she is going to have three months off, or she can’t use the VDU, she’s pregnant… wish I could get pregnant…’

Holidays

Women in the lower grades had fewer holidays than women in higher grades. They have on average 19 days leave. Respondents tended to take ten to fourteen days of these as formal holiday leave, the balance they reserved for childcare purposes, lest their children got sick.

Transport

Fifty per cent of women in the lower grades were dependent on public transport in getting to and from work. The time taken to get to work varied. Twenty per cent took 30 minutes, 24% took approximately 45 minutes and 20% took an hour, while 6% took up to 90 minutes. Two commuters had applied for transfers to areas nearer their homes with no success.

Lunches

Lunch generally consisted of a sandwich in the office. This was the standard practice of 80% of these respondents. The cost of eating out was considered too expensive.

Husbands Occupations

Six of their husbands were civil servants, one an engineer and another a bank clerk, the remainder were all skilled workers. Seventy per cent of their husbands had finished their education at second level, twenty five per cent went to third level.

Domestic Arrangements: Child Care Arrangements

A quarter of respondents relied on relatives to care for their children. The most popular carer was one’s own mother, followed by one’s mother in law. 42% used childminders, 3% were cared for by fathers and 6% cared for in creches.

Inservice Training

With the exception of short word processing courses, women had not attended any in-service training. Two respondents were refused permission to attend French classes.

Rewards

Some complained that unlike in the private sector, there were no special rewards for extra effort. Some contrasted this to their friend’s experiences of Christmas gifts and free lunches on special occasions.

Tax Allowances

In cases where they opted for joint assessment, the woman’s take home pay was very low. This helped to depress her return for work. When this factor was added to her long day, if one includes travel time, there were few economic rewards. The lowest income families could not afford paid childcare. Their mothers and mothers-in-law provided free childcare instead.

CHAPTER FIVE

Women in the Middle Grades

The Middle grades as defined for present research purposes are: Staff Officer (including Staff Officer, Supervisor of Typists), Executive Officer and Higher Executive Officer. The Executive officer grade is both a recruitment grade and a promotional grade while the others are all promotional grades. The description of these as middle grades was done for the following reasons: (1) up to the grade of Higher Executive Officer staff can be paid overtime and (2) the next post that of Assistant Principal is a qualitatively different post as it is concerned with policy formation.

Nine Executive Officers, six Higher Executive Officers and eight Staff Officers were interviewed. All, with the exception of five of the EO’s, had been promoted. Twelve had been recruited as clerical assistants, five of whom were recruited as typists. Four of the Staff Officers worked as supervisors of typists, a grade which has been all female. The others were general SO’s. Staff officers who were recruited as clerical assistants were promoted twice, the first by doing a written competition to become a clerical officer and the second promotion was usually based on seniority, personnel record and performance at interview.

Educational Levels

Three had entered with group or intermediate certificate; sixteen had leaving certs and four had degrees.

Interview Preparation

Those who had been promoted from Clerical Assistant to Clerical Officer and later to Staff Officers had all prepared extensively for the clerical officer competition, by attending classes and working on previous examination papers. Familiarity with the functions of the civil service and knowledge of current affairs were necessary to achieve success at interviews. Nobody attending interviews was told what to expect. It was entirely up to oneself to prepare and compete.

Perceptions of Discrimination

Half of the respondents felt that women had the same chances of promotion as men. The same proportion thought women were as interested in promotion as men whereas nine respondents disagreed and two were undecided. Some of the staff officers felt that married women were not treated equally.

’I don’t think married women with children have any chance. I think once a panel or an interview board know you are married with children, you are perceived in a different light to men. Married men are perceived to be enthusiastic, responsible people who want to get on. Married women are seen as the opposite. A lot of men in top management feel that married women should not be working, they should be at home caring for their children. They think married women are blocking jobs especially in these days when there is so little promotion’.

This respondent told of one negative experience in her section. There was a competition to establish a panel for SO’s. Both she and another mother were working as SO’s in the section. A male appointed to the new panel of SO’s and awaiting placement said to them:

’If you stayed at home and cared for your husband and children, I would have your job’.

Several respondents felt that women candidates were more likely to be ’passed over’ One respondent:

’I often wonder why some people are ”passed over’, its all very vague, women are often passed over… But they are passed over. They are not as aggressive. Men are not as tied down as women. Men demand things more. Women don’t push themselves as much. Those who chose their company seem to move’.

Several references were made to the negative attitude to married women held by older men:

’With older men there is an anti-married woman attitude - that should be overcome… it prevents women from getting transferred at times’.

Higher Executive Officers

Of those who had achieved Higher Executive officer posts, two had entered the service as Executive Officers so they had been promoted once. Two had entered as clerical assistants and two as clerical officers. For the former they had to progress from CA to CO by written examination, then to SO by interview, to EO by written examination and finally to Higher Executive officer, by written examination or by interview or on seniority. The move from CA to HEO required four promotions which is quite an achievement over time. The women who managed to do that had entered the service in the late sixties and early seventies. They are older than Executive Officers and have longer service. The progression to HEO was quite demanding and required lots of interview and examination preparation. The following case history and comments illustrates the progression.

Joan entered in 1969 as a clerical assistant, spent five years in one department and then was seconded to another for a year. After the prerequisite six years she did the confined Clerical Officer written examination. In preparation for this she went to night classes to brush up on Mathematics and English. She got it and then had to move to another department where she remained for over a year when she was transferred to her present department. Shortly after her arrival there, there was a competition for staff officer, based on interview performance. She continued:

’The first interview was very tough as only one of of ten was to be picked… to go on to the next stage, from our department. The next stage was interdepartmental and interviews were by the Civil Service Commission. I got through the first stage - I remember fighting so hard for that… I really went into that interview to get it. I got placed quite high on the second interview and was retained in this department as SO’.

She went on to do a confined EO competition again based on two interviews. She was successful and was subsequently made a HEO in 1986 on seniority. In preparation for interviews she read up on current affairs and did quite a lot of preparation.

’I was passed over once for HEO on the grounds that I wasn’t experienced enough. My sick leave record is excellent… the children have not obstructed my work… I was very upset at the time. Now I do realise that I wasn’t experienced enough. I resented it because it wasn’t my fault that I hadn’t enough experience’.

Given this long route it is probably not too surprising that many women when they reach HEO level, feel they have reached their limit. The above respondent elaborated on the implications of a move to Assistant Principal.

’The next grade is an AP, but I’m happy as I am. But the days of doing night courses are past… It would be an interview. I don’t want any more responsibility. I am happy the way I am. HEO is fairly standard in terms of hours’.

This reluctance to move up to AP was stated by another respondent:

’At present, it suits me to stay as I am - the responsibility of AP is much greater, time is not your own. The HEO is an overtime grade. You do get paid for overtime whereas if I went to the next grade I would not be paid overtime, it’s supposed to be included in one’s salary… You can often be required to stay early into the morning in some sections. And the problem in the Civil service is that you can be posted anywhere… there’s no consultation’.

Later on in the interview the previous interviewee was asked whether women were as interested in promotion as men, she thought not:

’I think men have this thing that they are the breadwinner… and women don’t have that same drive or motivation’.

One notes a tendency to generalise from one’s own situation in her comments. When asked about whether she intended to study, she replied:

’No, that is where I will fall down in competition with my male colleagues who are always doing night courses. As a mother of two children I couldn’t do that’.

Another respondent who was recruited in 1967 and was a HEO thought her prospects of becoming an Assistant Principal were very slight. She claimed that because Administrative Officers had in the past been guaranteed promotion to AP, they had hindered HEO’s progress.

’They have cut across on the rest of us. It slows us down a lot. I’m about seventh in a seniority list. I could be waiting about fourteen years as there is only one promotion every two years. This level is gummed up’.

Children

Six women had one child, twelve had two, four had three and one had six. The latter was a women who had left on marriage but was subsequently allowed to return to work on compassionate grounds as her husband was unable to work and received disability benefit. Permission to be reinstated as a temporary officer was given by the Minister.

Childcare

The most common form of childcare among this group were childminders, followed by own relatives and then home based childcare.

Work Satisfaction

Fifteen respondents (65%) described their work as interesting, two as “okay” and six as “boring”. The most pleasing aspects of their jobs were: intrinsic interest 48%(11); social aspects 44%(10) and financial 8%(2).

Life-style

Eleven drove themselves to work, one was driven by husband, two cycled and nine came by public transport. For nine of these respondents, lunch consisted of a sandwich consumed in the office; two had lunch in work based canteens and nine had lunch in a local restaurant.

Husbands’ Social Class

Seven were married to Civil Servants; three to skilled workers, three to professional employees, five to men in social class three, one husband was a full time homemaker and one was unable to work.

CHAPTER SIX

Women In Higher Grades

As table (l)p.21 illustrated there are few women in the top grades in the General Service. The explanation advanced for that in the past was that women prior to the removal of the marriage bar in 1974 had to resign on marriage. Women who are in these posts have therefore been in continuous full-time employment in the Service for many years, recruited in the late sixties or early seventies. My eleven interviewees are a first-cohort of married women with children, drawn from a very small cohort of women, the first group to benefit from the abolition of the marriage bar in 1974. Many of the women recruited with them left the Service on marriage or when they had children. They will be working in male-norm dominated conditions while continuing the traditional role of a wife and mother.

Promotional Routes

To gain a high level post Assistant Principal equivalent or above, there are two routes: a longer route taken by those who enter at EO grade or below and a shorter one taken by graduates who enter as Administrative Officers. For the former group the move from HEO to AP is very crucial as the AP promotion basically establishes that you are potentially of policy-making calibre, as compared with staff who will carry out executive policy formulated by the upper grades.

Graduate recruits have an upper honours degree and are all seen as having promotional potential. For a time during the seventies when it was difficult to attract graduates to the Civil Service, some cohorts were guaranteed promotion to the Assistant Principal level within six or seven years. For the majority, promotion remains competitive.

Promotional Criteria

The criteria used in promotion to the higher grades are seniority, ability/suitability and interview performance.

Seniority

As women remain at work they will satisfy the seniority criterion. Respondents felt that where women were concerned seniority was a necessary if not sufficient criterion for promotion. They were unlikely to be promoted without having achieved seniority, even if seniority did not always take precedence, as the following interviewee said:

’It happens… it happened here… you do get promoted over, there’s no doubt about it. But I think that women - we have to play the seniority part…’

’In this department I think what seniority does for you is… you are up there and that can’t be ignored… if you are a good person and senior… it’s very hard to ignore you’.

Graduates can measure their comparative progress vis a vis the cohort with which they entered. As women graduates in the past tended to leave, those who remained had to compare their progress with that of their male peers. This exerted a certain pressure on them to progress, and may have encouraged them to adopt male norms of progress and practice. As one respondent elaborated:

’… if you begin in the administrative grades there is a pressure on you to maintain your peergroup position… if you don’t move after a certain amount of time you begin to feel you’re not measuring up. At our level most people are very ambitious. You can’t afford to lose your place… you lose your credibility’.

’The problem has been that most of the group that started with me left before the lifting of the marriage bar, or when they have had a number of children’.

Ability - Merit

All except two of the women in higher grades had degrees. Three had postgraduate degrees.

The interviews revealed that seniority may not be quite as important now in some departments and that increasingly merit will be given priority. In practice, that might be used to explain why some candidates can be ’passed over’ in favour of others with less seniority. A senior respondent spoke of the changing emphasis in her department on ability and suitability rather than seniority.

’Seniority doesn’t matter anymore. For top level appointments its suitability - your ability to impress an interview board and your background. I have been very lucky to have had such a variety of work’.

Merit is assessed on the basis of work done which in turn depends on the type of work one is assigned. In all departments there are the ’better sections’, ’the plum jobs’ which enable workers to demonstrate their abilities and earn a good reputation. Work which improves one’s visibility to one’s seniors is a definite promotional requirement. These high visibility areas vary from department to department but are likely to include secondment abroad, special committee work, working in the Minister’s office, parliamentary legislation and EC related work. Women who are now in top positions all travelled or had interesting assignments.

For some respondents this was a matter of luck.

’I have been lucky to have had such a variety of work’

Some admitted that they had been offered ’plum jobs’ i.e. assigned to interesting work by senior staff while others had to seek such work themselves by asking to transfer from one particular area or by showing a very positive interest in particular assignments.

’there is a large element of fate, but you can influence your work. I mean if you are in a section where you are happy and it suits your situation you can settle back and get stuck, but if you make it known that you would like to move and broaden your experience you are accommodated to an extent’

’A lot of it boils down to your particular boss and how they promote you and your visibility… There are areas where you are very visible and others not…’

If however, women are not given or allocated high visibility work, then of course this is a form of indirect discrimination, and there is some evidence to suggest that this happens in some departments. Sometimes it is because of the patriarchal attitude of senior officers to women as the following respondent indicated:

’If you take it at its face value - there is nothing to deter women, they do have the same promotion opportunities. The allocation of work can be a problem. I can think of at least two places where senior men would refuse to have women in their sections… I can’t judge across departments or know how widespread this is. This is unfair to women…’

Competency can leave a worker in one section for too long, sections such as accounts earn these reputations. This restricts their experience and they are less likely to be promoted. One respondent who tried to get out of accounts said:

’they did not want to transfer me as somebody else would have to be trained to do the job. If you are competent in a job, you are left there’.

These areas where one was less visible included accounts and personnel sections. They were referred to by respondents as the ’housekeeping sections’.

Exclusionary Practices

A second form of indirect discrimination is the manner in which women can be excluded from male networks, informal settings where men from different grades can meet, exchange ideas and display their talents, again facilitating their visibility and subsequently the visibility factor. Women report that they are to some extent excluded from such networks. As one respondent elaborated:

’At the end of the day there are less women promoted than men but there are a number of reasons for this’.

’There are subtle things - working in the Minister’s Office is a kudo… the male network is huge… the golf is very important. Women don’t have the same prospects for socialising… it’s an important factor yet women are excluded from it. Socialising varies from department to department. It also depends on the facilities available. Here they have a room upstairs which I don’t go to… its too smokey. I opt out for that reason… males tend to dominate the conversation another reason I don’t go’.

The above shows some of the hidden or indirect forms of discrimination or exclusion women experience, some of which such as golf club membership are legally enshrined. There are also patriarchal assumptions i.e. the ’Minister’s’ office is presumed to be and was in the past a male dominated position, with the majority of Ministerial parts being occupied by men.

Male networking takes place on the golf course or in the pub, typically on Friday evenings.

’There are problems about the pub on Friday evenings. I tend to go home, I know politically it might be important - in our job we have huge stresses and there are great demands made on us…’

’The evenings I finish on time I go home so I miss the pub network which is big… pub networks and male networks will assume an importance… it’s not supposed to yet I don’t think many people would deny that it is important’

’There’s also the chummy atmosphere among men… women either don’t have the time or inclination to partake in male networks which are based in the pub, they would prefer to go home on Friday evenings and this can be bad for one’s career. Only one department has initiated an equivalent ’ladies circle’ which raised some male eyebrows’.

The Interview

The third promotional criterion is interview performance. Researchers have identified interviews as possible areas of discrimination. In formal departmental and interdepartmental competitions the assessment instrument is an interview, acknowledged as being difficult. Some respondents disliked interviews in general, and some complained that they were all male-dominated and all agreed they were difficult. One respondent at Assistant Principal level avoided them and so avoided further competition.

’Yes, there were interviews I could have done. I didn’t do them because I didn’t want the hassle and I hate interviews. I hate them. I get really worked up about them. There is a lot more competition for them. You could be asked anything in those interviews - you would need a detailed knowledge of the economic and social scene, public sector and current affairs and your work. You would have to do a lot of studying and preparation… at the minute I’m happy enough’.

A highly successful servant had this to say.

’I went through a series of three interviews… a knock out system. There were a hundred people for that one job - that was very competitive… the interviews are very policy related, they are tough interviews, they are very searching in trying to get your views and reactions to a whole range of issues, the work you have actually done is a small percentage’.

‘For top level appointments it’s suitability - your ability to impress an interview board and your background’.

Another respondent had a more negative impression. She aspired to assistant secretary level which she thought she might obtain eventually… ‘with a modicum of luck and sticking it out’.

’The interviews here are horrendous - very sexist… they are made up of all males… retired men…’

Peer Evaluation

The final form of assessment is peer evaluation which is used in some departmental and interdepartmental competitions instead of interviews for the higher posts. In this system your promotional opportunities depend on the ability of your boss to have you promoted over and above other candidates simultaneously proposed by their bosses. In these cases it is a combination of the superior’s persuasive power in addition to one’s achievements which helps procure promotion for the aspiring civil servant. Some respondents said that one’s success in that situation depended on how well one’s boss ‘pushed for you’ rather than on the individual qualities of the applicant. While this spares the applicant from an interview, it makes her dependent on a senior official nominating and defending her nomination. Women are less likely to be nominated and even if they are there is a greater likelihood of their being rejected by the others, particularly for the most senior positions. This might well be an explanation for their absence in the top posts.

Structural Factors in Promotion

(a) Expansion in Service

One of the factors which can influence any individual’s opportunities at work is the extent to which new posts are created or vacancies arise. The cohort recruited in the sixties and seventies benefited from the opportunities provided by that expansionary era, which offered good work opportunities and promotional prospects. One respondent:

’I had extremely interesting and stimulating jobs. There was a vast amount of work to be done, we were very understaffed and it was a time when really if you carved out a role for yourself, people were delighted and there was no question of prohibition or sense that you were a junior to be taking on too much’.

This certainly provided scope to some servants to move up rapidly in the seventies. Some were even promoted prior to having served the required time at certain grades.

(b) The Embargo: Its Negative Consequences

In contrast, the public sector embargo of the eighties has had a negative effect on promotional opportunities for all. In many departments promotions have almost been at a standstill. A low average age within departments, and too few retirements leaves many civil servants aspiring in vain for promotion. The inevitable result of this is frustration, low morale and increased competition. One undesirable result of this is a negative attitude towards women competitors including a certain disdain for maternity leave.

’There will be a lot of back stabbing… but I think women in general don’t engage in that… whereas I’ve noticed a very marked aggression towards women, particularly towards taking maternity breaks, etc., recently - the trend is perceptible’.

Thus in times of restricted promotional opportunities women may experience more stress. In addition the structural limitation on promotional opportunities will reduce their future promotional prospects.

In one case a mother was forgoing her holidays to ‘cover’ for her friend who was going on maternity leave. Her colleague had covered for her the previous year.

(3) Workload

One of the effects of a fear of discrimination is an intensified effort to prove oneself by putting the job first and working very hard. In fact research indicates that women have to work harder to be seen to be equal to men. Women in higher grades have adopted ‘male norms’ of working long hours and giving work (as opposed to family) a central place in their lives. This means working through lunch hours, late into the evening and even neglecting to take one’s due holidays.

’I know my PO used to say that she was tired of proving herself and she was single and quite effective’.

’I think women have to prove themselves more - I think there’s always a question over women’s commitment - you have to be careful about getting time off… its assumed you have problems with your children…’

‘Women’s own perceptions are that they have to work harder’.

(d) Hours of Work

Quite a number of my respondents worked through their lunch breaks and often worked until six or seven o’clock in the evening. Their domestic arrangements were such that they could work late and simply telephone home saying they had to stay on to complete some work. Others however opted to eat a main meal in the middle of the day and took a lunch break claiming that ‘they work better after it’ and then worked late in the evening instead. In this sense they have adopted traditional male norms and will not let their home lives and demands intrude on their work - work comes first. Some individuals have adopted a workaholic practice; ’I work from 9.15 on through lunch and never leave before six o’clock’.

’I very frequently work very late depending on the work I have to get through’.

At that stage that respondent was working quite regularly until 8 o’clock, going home almost straight to bed exhausted. Her particular section was simply extremely busy. Extra assistance did not appear to be available even though a colleague in another section was actually bored because she had not enough work to do. For other posts one was on call over the weekend.

(e) Holidays

The number of days annual leave varies by grade. The higher grades have approximately thirty days as compared with only eighteen days in the lowest grades. Respondents in the higher grades were often unable to take them.

‘I have 30 days annual leave but it’s a struggle to take them’

‘I have 29 days holidays - but I find it hard to take any, I only took 10 days this year’

(f) Role Stereotyping

Women are typically assumed to carry the double burden. But they must never be seen to let this affect their commitment to work. For some of my respondents this assumption became a source of pressure in the sense that one had to keep one’s domestic problems outside the workplace… One woman spoke about the additional pressures on women because they are ’carers’.

’Men are not in the same position - In my own case I was treated very much the same. Of course it always depends on your commitment… I mean if you look for special concessions and take ‘lates’ and sick leaves, its alright up to a point but if it takes a pattern it becomes identified with the fact that its your domestic situation that’s causing this so you have to be careful for you might not get the better sections’.

Centrality of Work

As can be seen from the above reports, if women put their work first this will have an impact on their own domestic lives, changing traditional patterns and this too produces certain stresses from time to time. American research suggests that successful career women can meet with spousal jealousy.

’… but of course there are resentments and times when he resents that my career has taken over our lives and that surfaces at time… but we both realise the material comforts which come from my job.”

Another respondent about her husband:

’My husband is not as strongly career oriented as I am. He is very supportive of me and moved job at one stage to suit me… he sometimes resents the commitment and long hours I work. He is very good about my travelling abroad but its really only a spasmodic basis… but I think that if it went on a regular basis he wouldn’t be very happy about it’.

Supportive Husbands

Sometimes this double burden is reduced by the husband assuming a major responsibility for child care, limiting their career prospects, by requesting career breaks or in a few cases leaving their jobs. Such men, who want to assume a non-traditional role - in accommodating a wife’s career development - can find it difficult, as for instance in trying to secure a career break if they are in the civil service. They are seen as uncommitted workers. In a few cases this resulted in their eventual retirement from the service and their subsequent pursuit of alternative careers. Women in higher grades are more likely to have husbands who changed career, restricted their career development or gave up full-time jobs to facilitate their wives’ career and their children’s upbringing. Such accommodating spouses have made a difference to the women’s lives.

’Yes my situation is very different. In many ways I feel I’m in the position of the traditional male whose wife is working part time and running the home efficiently and has primary responsibility for looking after the children. I’m lucky that my husband is more like the traditional spouse’.

This respondent acknowledges her ’luck’ for being in the position that a majority of career oriented males would have enjoyed continually by having supportive wives. She acknowledges difficulties for women who are married to traditional males.

’for I think in the traditional case it’s very tough on women’.

Such women accept and live with the realisation that their jobs take priority just as successive male cohorts have done before them. Their famillies accept this position and their male partners have adjusted their work commitment accordingly in a manner which for a variety of reasons they are pleased with.

Childcare

Three have one child; six have two children; one has three children and another has four. Most research cites lack of childcare facilities as a major obstacle to women’s participation in the labour force and her promotional opportunities in the workplace. These respondents have satisfactorily solved their childcare needs. They approached child care as they would approach any other task to be accomplished.

’I think if you are serious about working you will set yourself up in a situation that allows it all to move smoothly. The one thing I was very serious about was to find someone who could look after her on a long term commitment… I wouldn’t put her in a creche. O.K., that’s easier said than done. I can afford to pay for it. You have to say to yourself am I serious about it all? You have to be very rational about it all. You can’t half do a job.

Higher incomes enable them to hire home helps when their children are young, pay for good nurseries or in a few instances employ a full time nanny. One respondent elaborated on the advantages of the latter:

She says, ’I have absolutely no worries. It’s so convenient. I got this women through personal contacts and she has been excellent… she does the housework whatever she can… but her priority is the children. She looks after them completely, they have their lunch and tea with her, she looks after their clothes and she is extremely reliable. It think she has been enormously important for me’.

Yet even fortunate mothers like her have a guilt complex. She and all mothers experience some form of guilt complex as she elaborated:

’Sometimes I think they don’t do much extra, so maybe if I was at home they might do more… I really do think that working mothers carry a guilt thing. On the other hand my

husband points out that I would not be happy at home full time and that would be much more damaging’.

’I’m pleased with the arrangements. I feel guilty at times but I feel that’s conditioning… I sometimes feel I’m missing the best years of her life. She gets lots of attention… the only negative aspects is she sees lots of television’.

’I do feel resentment at times for not being able to spend the time with my children. But if one has an interesting job one has to expect to pay’.

This respondent’s child is looked after by a child minder and collected from there by her husband at four o clock. Her home, the child minder and her husband’s job are all near each other - again according to plan. If young children are being left to childminders several mothers actually prepare their children’s food which they deliver to the childminder… even if it means a bit of extra work.

’I make three dinners on Saturday. He (husband) might cook vegetables to go with the prepared food. I like cooking anyway. I give the child minder a prepared dinner for my daughter. I prefer to do this. I know what she is getting’.

The care and development of their children is always to the forefront of their lives.

Some cope with the double burden by actually reducing it as, for instance omitting to cook an evening meal. This is more likely to happen when husband and wife can eat in work-based canteen or at a restaurant at lunchtime.

’I don’t cook an evening meal, I just have tea with my son, play with him and then give him a bath before bed’.

Others reduce the double burden by paying for house-cleaning. The latter is done by a part-time woman worker who comes in for a few hours per week. The advantage of such reductions is that it leaves the weekends and some nights free for time with their children, the week-end becomes quality time for the children.

Some respondents adjusted their children’s routine to permit them to see more of their mothers. As can be gleaned from the extracts quoted above, their long workdays would leave women without time for their children if the latter go to bed regularly at 8 o’clock. Some respondents however have got their young child to take an early nap so that they can stay up late at night and have some time with them. In these examples family time is organised to fit in with working life.

All of the women in top positions were concerned about the children’s development But they had solved childcare to their satisfaction and in a way which left them entirely free to devote themselves to work. Working late, unexpectedly did not present a problem. They had adopted male norms and successfully competed in a male dominated world. Home and work are separate and segregated spheres.

’A lot depends on the level that you are at and if you have a good salary and can afford good childcare, if you have an interesting job - you’re more likely to feel that you want a separation of job and home’.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Women on Career Breaks

There were a number of reasons why women took career breaks. The most important one was for child care purposes. Not surprisingly, given that the sample for the pilot study was drawn from women who took a career break to care for children, all women interviewed gave child care as a reason for taking a career break. Of the fifteen interviewed, however, only two would have ‘resigned’ to look after children. A further two had taken a career break rather than be separated from their husbands. They were married to men who lived down the country and when they failed to get a transfer, on the arrival of a baby, they took a career break. The option of a career break must therefore be cited as a second reason for taking one.

Older Children’s Needs

In this small sample of fifteen, there was a range of family size and age. Somewhat surprisingly, four women had older children and had for a number of years combined work and childcare. Older children had different needs and made different demands on their parents to those of young children.

Firstly, the children were reluctant to go to childminders, preferring to stay in their own homes. Secondly, they had homework to do and this was a very important matter for their mothers. By the time parents had arrived home from work, cooked a dinner, put on a fire and organised younger children for bed, it was too late for homework supervision. Childminders had other children to mind and hence could not be expected to help children with homework. This was an activity in which it was difficulty to find someone to whom it could be delegated. The four respondents with older children and two others - one who was expecting her fourth child - stressed the importance of intellectual stimulation and supervision of children’s homework. Their husbands all belonged to social classes one and two and earned salaries of £20,000 or more per annum. All remarked that their children were much happier and better adjusted since they had ceased work.

Young Children’s Needs

Five of the respondents had not returned to work since the birth of their first child: their career breaks followed their maternity leaves. Three were pregnant with their second child and three mothers had two young children. They had very traditional attitudes to childcare and had a very high commitment to mothering. They thought that the best way to look after children was to become full-time mothers themselves. This was, they explained, probably due to their own very positive experiences of childhood. They had memories of their mothers always being there when children got home. They were very family centred, having still lost of contact with their own mothers. They wanted their children to have the cosy stable family they themselves enjoyed. As one respondent said:

’The family and a peaceful stable home are all that is left now’.

This demand for high quality childcare could only be met by themselves. The only alternative child minder would have been their own mothers.

Extended Career Breaks

All the respondents had extended their career breaks. Only two thought they would definitely return in about two years time. Three said they would not return, they were going to resing. The remainder were ambivalent about whether or not they would return. They would wait and extend their career break to its maximum of five years and then see how things worked out. Those with younger families thought that it was better to be with the children when they were babies and toddlers. As they got older and went to school it would be easier to get a suitable person to mind them, if they decided to return to work. At least, then, the children would be able to talk about things. One respondent mentioned job-sharing as a possibility for a gradual return. For the present they did not want to lose out on their children’s early years.

’I didn’t want to come home and have someone else tell me he cut his first tooth’, one mother said.

Some mentioned the possibility of taking up a different kind of work. Two thought they could help their husbands business and one woman, a typist was going to set up a typing service when her children were older.

Experiences at Home

It is important to note however that the career break option greatly facilitated all women’s decisions to leave. All (except two) admitted that resignation would have been too traumatic. This ’having the option’ approach helped them to initially enjoy being at home, ’as a break’. They were all pleasantly surprised by how much they enjoyed being at home, they were neither bored, depressed nor felt isolated. Many kept up telephone contact with their colleagues at work. All retained very close ties with relatives particularly parents whom they visited very frequently, for instance travelling down the country for the week-end. All found they had ’plenty to occupy themselves at home’. Women with young babies had no hobbies or outside interests, except one who used to go for singing lessons until she stopped work, then she could not afford to continue. Her husband was very musical and their favourite relaxation was to listen to records. Few of the housing estates in which they lived offered any amenities, though they had got to know the neighbours since they stopped going to work. Two of the women with older children had outside interests, one in drama and one in golf. The woman interested in drama was in a play for a few weeks and enjoyed it immensely, an opportunity she would not have had if she continued to work. The golfer however admitted that she played more golf when she worked! She was better organised! All of the houses with one exception were spick and span when I arrived ( without prior warning).

Work Experiences

All women with one exception claimed that they enjoyed paid work. The one who didn’t said she had little to do at work and got bored easily. Only two had never applied for promotion. Among the clerical assistants none had been promoted, though all had passed the examinations and had been put ’on the panel’. Vacancies had not occurred during the panel period of two years which meant they would have to apply all over again, competing against newer recruits, with little chance of success. One clerical officer who was offered promotion had to turn it down as she wanted to marry a farmer down the country and few clerical officer jobs ever became vacant therel Another executive officer refused a job with very good promotional prospects, she would have had to go to Brussels regularly, she planned to have a family, and ’could not be flying to Brussels’.

In two cases where the respondents had been promoted once and were eligible for a second promotion, they did not apply, because they were pregnant and psychologically they saw promotion as more responsibility, not compatible with family and babies. In many cases, family and babies came first and the job should just ’tick over’, with minimum involvement, seven emphatically said they had no ambitions and were not career women’ and never thought in terms of a career.

The sample of career break women included those who had rejected career development as well as those who had been denied it. In the lower grades, job tasks did not vary much between grades but financial rewards did. The women in the higher incomes were unambivalently more traditional in orientation towards childcare, whereas women on lower incomes felt that it did not pay them to work, so a traditional orientation was enforced or encouraged. Many of these women were interested in job-sharing, but the option was not on offer to them.

Financial Rewards

Money was an important aspect of both the decision to leave or return in the case of all clerical assistants interviewed. All had their incomes jointly assessed, which in practice means that their husbands got most of the allowances and consequently larger cheques. The respondents ended up with few tax allowances and so only took home £80 approx. If they paid a childminder £30, paid bus fares and lunches, the financial returns on their work were very low. All these expenses they deducted from their salaries, mentally and consciously, not from their husbands! As regards the proportion of family income earned, twelve of the sample were in low paid grades and all their husbands earned more. Of those who were in other grades, two worked as Executive Officers and earned identical incomes to their husbands as they had the same posts in the Civil Service, the third woman who earned a very high income was married to a self-employed man who earned even more. The sample had no examples of women who actually earned more than their husbands. Their husbands were all in secure employment, so while in some cases additional income would have been welcomed, the mother’s breadwinning status was not considered very important.

Division of Labour

During the period prior to taking a career break all but two of their husbands shared household tasks. The two errant husbands were self-employed and had demanding jobs, with very good salaries. One wife explained that her husband ’was not brought up like that’ and she would not dream of asking him to cook and do housework. He was incapable of looking after the children for a day, she said, in praiseworthy tones. When mothers were at home all the time, they did all of the housework and cooking, though the remainder said that their husbands would still help out, if required, and they ’were not fussy and would not expect everything to be done’. The main achievement was that they had more time for leisure. The evenings and week-ends were more enjoyable, as compared with the frantic pattern of dual career lives.

Domestic Outcomes of Career Breaks

Asked about a lack of economic independence since they stopped working, the respondents claimed they had not experienced it. All had joint bank accounts with full entitlement to spend. When they stopped work, they knew money would be tighter, but that was a choice they were willing to make to be with their children. ’We knew we could manage’. Certainly, couples seemed to have discussed it between them before taking the decision, and one felt that there was a genuine sharing of decisions. They did not feel enslaved or perceive themselves as economically dependent as one might have expected to find. Thus it may well be that when women voluntarily stop working, husbands are more supportive, less dominant and will not penalise a woman by reducing her control over finances when she does so! Financially, these women felt they had enough to live on, all couples were in the process of buying their own houses, had one car and a well furnished house. Some certainly had taken a drop in their living standards, but not a very big one they thought when all the costs were included. For those on low salaries, the net economic effects of working were very small and did not serve as an inducement to continue to work.

Experiences of Childminders

Some had not worked after their first child so they had no experience of childminders. Those who had left their children to childminders had mixed experiences. In one case a traditional long-standing arrangement had broken down when the housekeeper who came in to look after the children, got married and she was unable to find someone to replace her. In others they had a series of bad experiences with unreliable childminders. There were no nurseries or creches nearby to which they could leave their children. As new residents to an area, finding a suitable and trustworthy minder was a considerable problem.

Overload

While most research shows that women who work are expected to do all the domestic and childcare work as well, many of the women I interviewed said that their husbands shared domestic and childcare tasks and indeed the frantic after work schedule was done by both, i.e. feed the baby, put on the dinner, light the fire, collect the baby, organise the lunches, supervise the homework. In fact, it would appear that both experienced overload. The physical hassle, getting up at 6.30, leaving baby in at 7.45 and not getting back until 6.15 was simply too much. A feeling of exhaustion was shared by many mothers of young children. Leisure time was simply not available. The weekends were also very busy times, shopping, cleaning and laundry had to be done. It would really seem that three jobs had in effect to be done by two people. This took its toll and when it was all costed did not seem worthwhile. The solution was the traditional one in their cases, the mother resigns, or in this instance, takes a career break.

Long Working Days

The Civil Service is a very bureaucratic organisation, and while some degree of flexitime and job sharing was subsequently introduced, neither was available to the women interviewed, at the time they took career breaks. In Dublin, travel time to work really extends their working day making it difficult for them to enjoy much time with their children. They were faced with an all or nothing approach. Several would have opted for job-sharing as offering the best of both worlds.

Conclusions

The overall findings replicate Gerson’s findings in that these mothers are child-centred, earn a smaller proportion of the family income than their husbands and have traditional views on childcare. This strong commitment to motherhood had for some resulted in the rejection of a career in an effort to have an equilibrium between family and home. Promotion for some might have upset the balance. This was true of the women who have promotional opportunities.

For those on low pay, the financial rewards were not enticing, when coupled with the time expended in travelling to and from work and the costs incurred in childcare. If one actually enjoys being at home with the children, the traditional option was an easier one.

While the career break is a useful initiative, it is too early to judge its effectiveness. Among this sample, it seems to operate as a form of encouraged resignation, only time will tell whether women return to work or not. Other options such as part-time work or job-sharing should also be offered with a genuine spirit of enabling women to combine family and work.

CHAPTER EIGHT

New Ways of Working - Job - Sharers

Job sharing is the arrangement whereby two people voluntarily share a single full-time job, with the salary and employment benefits divided pro-rata. The rights, benefits and prospects normally associated with full-time work are conferred on part-time workers. Workers can have good jobs and free time.

The option of job sharing for career or domestic reasons was introduced by the Civil Service in 1984 as part of an equal opportunities policy. Almost all job-sharers are women who job-share for domestic reasons. Research conducted by Fine-Davis revealed that a majority of women who are unable to work full-time are very willing to work on a part-time basis. In practice, five days of job-sharing is like working part time but with full social protection.

Contract Terms

Women who were permitted to job-share signed a job-sharing contract for a period of one year or three years. Initially it was permitted for a three year period only. The way in which jobs were actually shared varied: one week on, one week off arrangement; working either mornings or afternoons; three days one week and two the following and working three half days and one full day.

Departmental Responses to Job-sharing Requests

There was considerable variation between departments in facilitating job-sharing requests. Departments who were anxious to shed staff were more flexible and accommodating while those who felt they were short staffed did not want to lose staff who might not be replaced. In practice it became a resource issue.

If two people in a department wish to job-share it is feasible provided they get an additional person to replace them, if not the department lose a post. It is more complicated if two people apply to job-share but are from separate departments, as departments have to agree to the allocation of the replacement post. As one respondent said:

’It is preferable to find some one in one’s own department which can be difficult… I got a partner eventually… then I applied with her… we had agreed terms’.

Some respondents made the initial request to the personnel section which in turn would try to find a job-sharing partner for the applicant. Other respondents had actually found someone in the same grade who also wanted to job-share and then they made a joint request to jobshare to personnel. The former process could take a long time, up to three years in one case. According to the respondents far more women are interested in job-sharing than are being accommodated by their departments. Those interested may have to wait several months before they are accommodated, putting women under considerable pressure and strain. One respondent said:

’It’s unfair the way they dangle job-sharing before you and then you can’t get it’.

Restrictions on Job-sharing

Job-sharing was more acceptable at the lower levels and while some departments facilitated job-sharing in the higher grades, others refused to permit it. Where permitted, such arrangements were preceded by long discussions as to whether the work lent itself to job-sharing or not. In some cases to overcome this argument intending job-sharers had to change to work which was compartmentalised and so could unquestionably be open to job-sharing. This sometimes meant a lower level of intrinsic job satisfaction, a price respondents were quite willing to pay for the other benefits job-sharing offered.

Work-related Factors which Encourage Job-sharing

Job-sharing adjusts the balance between work and family in favour of the family. There are work related and family reasons for such adjustment.

The work related factors which draw women from the work-place into the family are: alienation at work due to a change in working conditions; low staff morale; the feelings that as married women they were stigmatised; no promotional opportunities.

In two cases it was the re-organisation of the typing arrangements which was alienating. The new arrangements were introduced without any consultation, as the following respondents outlined:

’Work comes in from all sections… I have lost interest in it’.

’Morale has gone downhill a lot… I would not trust them as… far as I would throw them… We were never consulted about anything… It’s the underhand way it’s done…’ (CA typist)

’I think there is still a stigma attached to being a woman’…

’Women have to work twice as hard to get noticed’ (CA)

Career ambitions have been cooled out either by a failure to be promoted or by the existence of few promotional opportunities.

’there is no promotion anyway and as a jobsharer you have little chance… they don’t like job-sharers. It’s seen to be indicative of your commitment…’

Outcomes of Job-sharing at Work

The lack of promotional opportunities facilitates job-sharing at a psychological level as women feel they are not losing out on promotional prospects. However job-sharing in turn tends to lower promotional aspirations lest it is unavailable at a higher grade. Job-sharers are unsure of the eventual impact of job-sharing on their promotional opportunities but most feel it will not be to their benefit as it will be seen as confirmation of management view that they as women are less committed to their jobs.

Equilibrium

Alternatively some women are not alienated but have opted for a certain mode of equilibrium in their lives. They don’t want additional responsibilities and they want to put more effort into their family lives. In reply to the question as to whether women are as ambitious as men one respondent said:

’I think they are in general but I do think there comes a point when they feel that’s enough for the moment. I reached a stage when I wasn’t prepared to take on any more responsibility or give any more of my time’ (HEO)

’I am not ambitious now. I want to do a good job with my children’ (AO sharer).

Domestic Reasons for Job-sharing

There are three main family based factors which predispose women to job-share: a traditional attitude to childcare i.e. the need to spend time with their growing children and a guilt feeling if they can’t do so, and secondly the pressure of the double burden of paid and domestic workloads and thirdly the demands of young children.

Childcare

Job-sharers were more likely to feel that their children needed more of their time than full time working mothers did. They themselves also wanted to have more time to enjoy their children growing up.

’I just wanted more time to spend with my children and family… it’s tiring working full time’

’I find I have the best of both worlds, can spend a lot of time with my children… so I don’t feel guilty about leaving them’

’I didn’t want to miss out on his growing up… I was coming home when he was going to bed, so I decided to job-share’.

The post - baby phase of child rearing presents different problems for working mothers viz. transport to and from school, facilitating extra-curricular activities, the supervision of and the assistance with homework. These activities are difficult to delegate to childminders.

Double Burden

The excessive weight of the double burden of family and work was the second reason for jobsharing. On closer analysis of the interviews, it emerged that much of the excessive pressure of the domestic burden was due to the lack of contribution to tasks on the part of their husbands and an absence of any paid homehelp.

’I couldn’t cope with it and so I opted for job-sharing’

’Working full time was really terrible’

’I felt I needed to give my children more attention and the physical strain was too much’

’I can have more time with my children, house, organisation, cooking etc., it takes the pressure off’.

In some cases a husband’s neglect of domestic responsibility was due to the type of job he had and his career orientation. These men were more career oriented, worked longer hours, travelled abroad and studied more than husbands of full time working mothers.

’When he had a prestigious job, I had the whole responsibility for childcare and housework’

’My husband does a lot of overtime. Money is status for him’

’My husband travels a lot… to conferences, he is an easy going person… but is ambitious… he would like to work in Brussels… on childcare? He could do more…I have

assumed all the responsibility. He indulges himself a bit… He is much more relaxed than I. The ultimate responsibility for housework and children is mine’.

In other cases, it was a question of husbands’ competence rather than his time. Women felt that husbands were incompetent and could not do household tasks as well as respondents could.

‘I do most things myself. I can’t stand him helping. I prefer him not to… I have to do it myself, make sure it’s done right’

‘My husband is bad at housework, he does some cooking and plays with the children’.

In the latter cases the husbands were not encouraged to play an equal role in housework and childcare tasks.

Domestic Outcomes of Job-sharing

One of the outcomes of job-sharing in the domestic scene is that the part time working wife now has more time for domestic tasks and she assumes total responsibility for childcare and domestic tasks enabling the husband to be free from these tasks. She basically assumes a traditional role. The result is increased leisure time for both especially more relaxed week-ends. Men who wish to pursue studies or devote more time to their work are facilitated.

‘It’s fabulous really, I also wanted more time for myself.’

‘It’s really my job… he does help. But now he can concentrate on the job and do his study… he knows that I’m there… he does his bit, if he were not studying he would do more’ (EO job-sharer whose husband has been studying for five years).

Job-sharing enables women to partake of the traditional role of women in the home, while combining it with a working life. As described by themselves, they enjoy the ‘best of both worlds’. They reduce the work overload by having the time spent in paid employment, which leaves them more time for family and domestic tasks. If job-sharing was not available, some job-sharers would instead have opted for a career break, others would have continued to work full-time, enduring very stress laden lives as they tried to cope with the double burden.

Job-sharing gives mothers more time for these activities. Having a car pool ensures that job-sharers can do their school run (swimming or dancing classes etc.,) when they are off and this will be reciprocated by other mothers the week they work. This enables children of working mothers to be personally facilitated in the way other middle class children are, so mothers feel less guilty about working. Job-sharing facilitates an ideal combination of work and childcare, for children of all ages and reduces considerably the burden of guilt and exhaustion which the alternative of full time work often produces.

The negative aspect of this arrangement is that it resolves the double burden issue by retaining the traditional division of labour in the home, while women work part-time. The positive aspect is that they continue to participate in the paid work force (rather than leave as women did in the past) with the option of returning to full-time employment in the future if they so wish.

Financial Effects

For those women who might otherwise opt for a career break, job-sharing is a less traumatic option both personally and financially. While it reduces their income it still give them financial security. It halves their working time, but due to tax savings, they receive more than half their net full-time take home pay. The net effect of this is a greater financial reward for the time they spend at work. They retain secure employment. In addition their child minding costs are at least halved.

CHAPTER NINE

Summary and Conclusions

Women in the Lower Grades

(1)An examination of the recruitment and promotion statistics, using a substantive criterion reveals a lack of equality of opportunity in the recruitment of women into Administrative Officer (Higher Grade) and Third Secretary positions and in their promotion from the grade of clerical assistant to clerical officer.

(2)Women predominate in the two lowest grades of Clerical Assistant and Clerical Officer. (Table 1p.21) As such women and subordinancy are combined and intertwined. It helps to retain the idea of male superiority as the latter dominate the higher grades and are more successful in being promoted from the lower grades. This identification, in turn creates problems of credibility and authority for women in higher grades.

(3)Work in the lower grades can be of a routine and boring nature. In the past this may not have been as great an issue as women left their jobs on marriage and turnover was always very high. Returns from departments indicates that it is in these junior grades that married women are mostly located. This is especially the case in regional offices.

(4)In the lowest grades, promotion is based on open competitions which means that established officers compete with school leavers in an examination system that favours school goers. This affects women disproportionately. There are high levels of dissatisfaction with promotional opportunities.

(5)When there are internal or confined competitions, the chances of promotion from the lowest grades are so distant as to be almost non-existent. Further, in competitions that do arise, women are still likely to be discriminated against. The majority of respondents in the lowest grades felt that women did not have the same promotional opportunities as men.

(6)Competitions are unpredictable and, since a public sector embargo, have been very infrequent. Even prior to the embargo, some candidates who were successful and put on a panel were never placed. After two years the panel expired and they due to the futility of effort did not re-apply. Those women who might have been ambitious were ’cooled out’ at an early stage.

(7)In practice it means that the majority of women employed in the Civil Service are in dead end jobs. In addition their payments fall into the category of low pay when compared with the average male industrial wage.

(8)Women in the two lowest grades with no chance of promotion form what might be termed an ’underclass’ of the Civil Service, a third of the Service staff. While fairer promotional procedures might enable more to be promoted, the reality is more likely to a future of remaining indefinitely a Clerical Assistant with no promotional prospects especially for those in regional offices.

(9)Another inequality was the variation in the number of days annual leave. It ranged from nineteen days for Clerical Assistant to thirty days for Assistant Principals.

(10)The limited days leave restricted both the length of holidays a woman could take, and the number of day’s leave she could use for childcare purposes. Many respondents dreaded running out of their leave and reserved days for emergency childcare purposes.

(11)Their low pay has of course an effect on their plans to remain on at work and on their replacement costs in the home. Women’s work in the home and her family has been a major problem in women’s incorporation into the labour market. In practice the decision to work in the case of mothers is an economically rational one, which in practice means that low pay is a disincentive to work.

(12)When they subtract taxation and childcare costs from their low wages, they have little left. Hence the attractiveness of the career breaks. The danger is that the career break becomes a form of retirement from the labour force. Child care for women who work in the lowest grades is subsidised by their families’ unpaid labour or by low payment to childminders. If they have more than two children they are likely to opt out of paid work. Those who stay on do so because their husband’s salary is low, uncertain or insecure.

(13)Women employed in the lower grades are more dependent on public transport to get to and from work. This takes longer and is more tiring than going by car.

(14)They do not partake of the perks of eating out or business lunches. On the contrary money is carefully budgeted.

Middle Grades

(1)Women who move up into the middle grades are therefore comparatively successful but few in such positions see themselves as ever getting beyond the Executive Officer level - at most to Higher Executive Officer level.

(2)The majority have reached a certain equilibrium in the arrangement between job and family.

(3)It is important to note that they have experienced significant promotional opportunities and are comparatively successful.

Senior Grades

(1)Women in Senior Grades in comparison to women in the lowest grades are comparatively advantaged. They could be said to represent the ultimate aim of liberal policy: to see women of ability (with children) get to the top.

(2)For women who had actually made it to the higher grades in all cases their early careers had assumed the male norm. They were older than average age when they married and/or had children. By then, their careers had advanced significantly. This was not as difficult for those women who had been recruited as graduates as many of them had benefited from the guaranteed promotional policy advocated in the seventies to encourage graduate applications. In practice after 7 years promotion from Administrative Officer to Assistant Principal was guaranteed.

(3)In addition women at the top had adopted male norms of organisational behaviour: in particular the Civil Service requirement that they must not ’watch the clock’ was observed. They all worked long hours, were available to work late or for travel within the country or for foreign travel as required.

(4)Without having comparative male data any explanations of their success are tentative. However, an analysis of their careers indicates that eighty two per cent were graduates and twenty seven per cent had postgraduate qualifications. Their working lives included overseas placement, secondment to major international bodies or specialised work assignments which gave them a competitive edge.

(5)They all enjoyed their work and while they felt that some departments were still sexist in orientation, overall attitudes to women were improving. While women they felt had the same chances of promotion as men, they highlighted forms of exclusionary practices which make it more difficult for women to have the pre-requisites for promotion.

(6)In highly competitive mixed departments, women felt that maternity leave was resented.

(7)Minority women in higher grade positions felt isolated from all male post-work pub networks where informal knowledge was transmitted and where some aspiring careerists were afforded an opportunity to display their talents. Women instead opted to go home instead of to the pub on Friday evenings. Even coffee sessions posed problems for minority women (women in higher grades in departments where most of such grades were held by men). Some felt that it was difficult at times to cope with the intense competitive ethos and scoring practices of male conversation.

(8)Sections of departments varied considerably in providing interesting opportunities for tasks which would supply performance visibility, very advantageous to one’s career. Bottom of this league were accounts, finances and personnel, areas where women dominated.

(9)Women in the higher grades were able to leave their children and family problems outside the office. They acted and must act as interested servants of the state.

(10)They all had solved their childcare problems, some were in a position to afford the ideal: home based care and in some cases additional housekeeping help. One could say that they had found wives, by affording their equivalent or by having supportive husbands.

Flexitime

Flexitime is now available in almost all departments and is from the point of view of women with children a tremendous benefit. It facilitates school runs, afternoon appointments etc. Many women use it to build up to free day per month. The only complaint was that the core hours were still too restricted and some women would prefer an earlier starting time. Women in departments and grades where it is not permitted, would favour its introduction.

Job-sharing

Job-sharing was available in some departments, but in some was confined to lower grades. All respondents thought that job-sharing should be available to all grades and in most types of work. Women who job-shared claimed they had the best of both worlds. However, most of them had to find co-job-sharers themselves and some had to wait quite a time before they could job-share. It was seen by most of the respondents as a great option, if one could afford it and wanted it. Where it was unavailable and prior to its introduction, a career break was the only option. Job-sharing has many advantages over a career break. A further disadvantage is that it does not re-distribute the responsibility of childcare as it still means that mothers take the responsibility for childcare. Men have not availed of it for childcare purposes. In the Civil Service the majority of job-sharers are women.

Career Breaks

While the introduction of career breaks for child care purposes was an excellent initiative, it runs the risk of becoming a form of early retirement. The career break scheme by its automatic extension discourages women from having a long term orientation towards work and family, adopting a year at a time approach. This could effectively ease women out of the labour market entirely, depriving them of work satisfaction and involvement and incorporating them to a greater extent in the home. The lack of contact between the departments and those on career breaks steadily separates women from the work environment completely. A newsletter to keep them in touch, advertise any job-sharing requests, or an opportunity to do some temporary work would help to make it more of a break than a retirement. There is a suspicion that it was introduced primarily as a staff shedding exercise and here again information on numbers returning from career breaks and number of those retiring are required.

Spousal Support

Spousal support in housework and childcare was generally lower than expected as Table —indicates. A crucial factor which differentiates job-sharing from full time workers was their spouses commitment to a career or the kind of job which involved lots of travelling. In these cases women had to carry the entire double burden.

Childcare

Satisfaction with childcare was a major factor in differentiating full-time working mothers from job-sharers and mothers on career breaks. Ambivalent career women were tempted to withdraw from the labour market if they had childcare problems while those women with satisfactory arrangements could concentrate on their careers. Child care facilities such as nurseries or creches are non-existent in the Irish Civil Service. Childcare is seen as a personal problem. The majority of respondents were in favour of some form of state support for working mothers: the provision of nurseries; tax allowances for childcare expenses; creches at work. All were in favour of a number of days parental leave for the care of sick children.

Class Differences

Women workers belong to different social classes; have different incomes and life-styles. While responsibility for children places a burden on all working mothers, those who earn low incomes are going to have to pay the same replacement costs for their childcare. They find it difficult to afford that and are more likely to rely on relatives to care for their children. They are least likely to employ housekeepers. As the number of children increases the financial returns on working are reduced. Reliance on public transport extends the length of their working day.

Experience at Work

Good experiences at work, promotional achievements, good childcare arrangements and spousal support all helped the retention of women in the Civil Service in all grades. The absence of one or more of these conditions was likely to tempt women to withdraw from work.

The Goals of Equal Opportunity Policy

The Equal Opportunities Policy booklet did not include any specific goals or identify what the eventual outcome of an Equal Opportunities policy might be. One advantage of introducing equal opportunity goals in conjunction with a policy is that it provides a basis against which implementation might be assessed. In addition, further information is required if monitoring alone is used to indicate equal opportunities. Age of candidate, years and places of experience, educational qualifications, competitions entered in addition to gender should all be included. Comparisons might then be made between cohorts of men and women recruited at the same time. In other words an equal opportunities policy has to be visibly pursued rather than having the status of ’a little white booklet’. Lack of such goals suggest that an equal opportunities policy is somewhat half hearted, a legal requirement rather than an organisational goal.

Effectiveness of Equality Policy

Despite the implementation of an equality policy, it appears that in cases of discrimination the only effective way the latter could be challenged was to bring the matter to the Labour Court. Monitoring per se does not produce equality in outcome.

Awareness of an Equal Opportunities Policy

Equally important in the pursuit of an Equal Opportunities Policy is to make all workers and job applicants aware of the existence of such a policy. This has not as yet happened. Advertisements do not proclaim an equal opportunities policy. Only 40% of the sample interviewed were aware of the existence of an equal opportunities policy in the Civil Service.

Perceptions of Equal Opportunities

52% of the sample felt that women had the same promotional opportunities as men, 45% disagreed while the remainder were undecided. Among women who had been promoted 63% thought that women had the same promotional opportunities as men as compared with only 42% of those not promoted. Rates of agreement varied by grade: 82% of respondents in higher grades agreeing they had as compared with 52% in the middle grades and 42% in lower grades.

Nor could this be explained by a lack of interest in promotion as 64% of the total sample felt that women were as interested in promotion as men and 70% of those who were promoted agreed that women were as interested in promotion as men.

If an equal opportunities policy is supposed to encourage women to apply for promotion then it too has failed: only 24% of the respondents had ever been encouraged to apply for promotion though this figure might also reveal that there were few competitions since the Equal Opportunity Policy was introduced.

Special Training for Women

Special training courses for women were introduced as part of an equal opportunities policy. Awareness of these was very low only 23% of respondents were aware of these, again awareness was greatest among those who had been promoted. This can explained to an extent by the course in question ’the woman manager’ which is aimed at women in middle management positions. Only twenty three per cent overall and thirty six per cent of respondents in the highest grades were aware of it. It might well be that other courses are required for women in the lower grades and that women in the higher grades might need other types of support systems.

Limitations of Equality Policy for Lower Grade Workers

There are serious problems in the lowest grades. Here one finds low pay and virtually no promotional opportunities. What has an equality policy to offer? Immediately, fair interview and promotional criteria to ensure equal treatment in promotion. This would still leave many workers confined to the lowest grades. For them low pay and holidays are issues which must be addressed. Up-skilling, additional bonuses and perks and job enrichment should be included on the agenda of an equal opportunities policy. The extension of equality in terms of holiday leave, in service and personal development training should be recommended. Unless these matters are examined within a broader context of equal opportunities, the programme will appear elitist.

Support for Women

An effective policy must also incorporate additional supportive training and career awareness workshops and seminars to assist women at all grade levels if it is to become more than a paper policy. Clearly, equal opportunities has not been developed within the Civil Service in this active form. Recent developments in management education have recognised the need for special training for women. It sees women as having gender based training needs precisely because they are women, due to a lack of role models, and to the isolation women as a minority experience in majority male organisations. Isolation, personal stress, exclusion from male networks are all issues of difference rather than of equality.

Limitations of the Liberal Model

One of the greatest problems with the liberal model is that it ignores the major difference between men and women… childbearing. It ignores childcare and the fact that women must decide between working at home or in the public sphere. The traditional model pulls them towards home and the liberal one treats the issue as an individualistic concern. The decision is in turn affected by her class position and that of her husband’s. Women themselves then, do not compete on equal terms with each other. They still do not compete on equal terms with men as family responsibilities are still not taken seriously by men. Flexibility, career breaks, job sharing have all been used by women, while fathers’ careers remain untouched. For that reason mothers competing in male dominated organisations will be at a disadvantage unless they can afford traditional male arrangement at home in the form of paid housekeepers instead of wives. Further maternal responsibilities will always be said to render women unreliable, unless they prove themselves better than men.

Women employed in the higher grades were in a position to pay for adequate childcare services and domestic labour and in that were were similarly placed to their male colleagues. Those who remained at work were careerist in orientation and competed equally with their male colleagues.

Women in the lower grades were not quite as fortunate as they were unable to afford domestic help and were more likely to rely on family subsidized childcare. Due to husband’s income or the uncertainty of his employment, these women had to remain at work as it provided the family with a secure if small income. Howewver, if childcare costs increased , then it made economic sense for women in the lowest grades to take a career break. The result is a return to the traditional role of full time mother in the home. It is however the part of the equal opportunities policy which is of most use to them. Its only positive aspect is that it guarantees them a job if they decide to return to work at a later stage.

Liberal policies permit married women to work but do not give them the childcare facilities to do so. Like meritocratic selection procedures, childcare arrangements are an individual matter. Liberal policies will not address the class or the economic issue of maternal replacement and childcare costs or indeed counteract the problem of low pay and this is central to mothers’ participation in the labour force.

Policy Implications

In addition, liberal adaptations contribute to the perpetuation of the traditional stereo-typed role, making it very difficult for women who have to continue to work or who want to continue to work. The latter are and feel like a minority afraid to assert their rights. If for a variety of reasons we would like to see a change from the traditional arrangement, then some positive action is called for. Tax allowances for childcare, greater opportunities for job-sharing, for part-time work, for paternal leave, properly run creches, continuous contact with women on career breaks, encouragement towards career and personal development would all help to address the imbalances of the past arrangements.

If these changes were made women could choose more easily between genuine options. Without such changes it is unlikely that the proportion of married women who continue to work will greatly increase.

Women Based Power

Women will always remain disadvantaged unless women’s work is as well paid and her career progression as guaranteed as that of her husband’s. To assist the latter an equality policy based on substantive criteria would help but consciousness among women in the organisation must be improved, information disseminated and new power basis among women created. This would in turn generate supportive structures for women.

New concentrations of power among women in the organisation are required. As one of the respondents said on equality ’I think it has been a battle all along… now women are coming out of the closet more… I don’t think women will be treated differently unless the women stand up for themselves’… The precise combinations of equality and difference will have to be worked out over time in the workplace and at home.

CHAPTER TEN

Final Recommendations

Equal Opportunities Policy and Implementation.

To facilitate the dissemination and implementation of an Equal Opportunities policy the following policy recommendations are made:

Staff Data Base.

(1) The implementation and extension of a computer based personnel data base is an immediate requirement if equal opportunities are to be monitored adequately. This data base should give information on age, year of recruitment, educational qualifications on recruitment, assignments, training courses taken, competitions entered and their outcome. This data base would have to be revised annually. The organisation and management of this data base should be the responsibility of an equality officer.

This is a prerequisite to the publication of a complete equal opportunities audit. The latter would establish a comprehensive picture of where men and women are in the Civil Service and how their positions and rates of career progress compare. It should include an analysis of the length of time spent in each grade, the number and type of training courses taken, applications for promotion, interviews attended and promotional outcome.

Equal Opportunities Policy.

(2) Equality officers should be appointed to each department, or depending on departmental size, large departments may require more than one, whereas small department might share an officer. The function of the equality officer is to increase awareness of equal opportunities policy, to monitor its implementation and to initiate measures which will help the Civil Service achieve its organisational goals as regards equal opportunities.

(3) The equality officers should also facilitate and encourage career planning, advising staff of forthcoming competitions, part-time educational or training courses and in addition organise courses to satisfy personal staff needs, as for instance, assertiveness or communication skills training.

(4) The Equal Opportunities booklet should be revised and re-issued to all staff. The revised version should include the specification of goals to be achieved by the Civil Service over time and outline the way the organisation hopes to meet these goals.

(5) Publicity for the programme should be extended, possibly through in-service seminars as part of in-service staff development.

Tax Allowances.

(6) The present system whereby tax allowances are distributed between dual earners usually allocates a larger proportion of the tax allowances to the male breadwinner. This has the effect of increasing his net salary while decreasing his wife’s. This should be replaced by a system which evenly divides their allowances, while ensuring that the maximum allowances are claimed.

(7) The lack of any tax allowances for children and for childcare expenses seems very unfair. While taxation policy is a large and complicated issue, a majority of respondents were in favour of tax allowances for children and for child care expenses. The provision of the latter it was thought would bring childcare out of the largely black economy, and would provide a better service for parents and better pay for childminders.

Recruitment and Promotion

(8) Existing guidance on recruitment and promotional board interviewing should be reviewed to ensure that interviewers are aware of biases which can occur and can guard against them influencing their decisions.

(9) Special training courses on interview selection and procedures should be updated continuously for those who sit on interview boards, and these courses should include aspects on the implementation of equal opportunities.

(10) Attempts should be made to include women as members of interview boards, if necessary, drawn from outside the Civil Service.

(11) A number of steps should be considered to increase the number of applicants for promotion and improve performance:

(i) the criteria for promotion from one grade to the next should be clearly stated.

(ii) the syllabus or content of written examinations or interviews should be available to prospective candidates.

(iii) Some consideration should be given to the content of written and interview assessments as to the proportion of content allocated to topics related to the individual Civil Servant’s work and that concerning other aspects of the Civil Service, including policy formation and changes.

(iv) Given the salience of the latter, it might be advisable to have staff seminars, as required, to inform all staff of new policies. This could be seen as a way of inculcating a corporate identity among all staff and facilitating interest in all aspects of the Civil Service.

(12) The provision of special interview training preparation courses may be desirable to enable candidates to do justice to their abilities at interviews.

(13) Given that promotional prospects in part depends on one’s experiences within the organisation, it is desirable that staff should have the opportunity of transferring from one section to another, and avoid being too long in one section.

Restructuring of Junior Posts

(14) The position of women in the lowest grade of Clerical Assistant is the most problematic, as opportunities for promotion are very few. In the past this was a transitory grade, as many women retired on marriage. As women now remain on at work, this can become a job for life. The grade falls firmly into the low paid work category and as it is composed almost entirely of women must be investigated under an equal opportunities initiative. At a minimum, all should have the opportunity over time of being promoted to clerical officers, but perhaps some restructuring of these posts, with new responsibilities, up-skilling due to new technology and other forms of job enrichment should be investigated. This task would probably require consideration by a special sub-committee set up to investigate the way the lowest grades might be re-structured giving greater personal development opportunities for staff.

Annual Leave

(15) Under a more progressive policy for workers generally, the question of the considerable variation in annual leave accorded by grade should also be addressed.

Special leave for Childcare Purposes.

(16) The statutory provision of a number of special days leave for the care of sick children as is possible in other countries should be made. Additional unpaid leave for the care of young children who are ill should also be available to assist parents in their combination of work and child care responsibilities.

New ways of working.

(17) Flexitime as the report shows is very well appreciated among staff; it should be extended to all departments and should be available to all grades.

(18) Job-sharing has also met with a very positive response. It should be more widely available and facilitated. The majority of those interviewed said that it is possible for all grades to effectively job-share. At present, there is considerable variation between departments in the extent to which job-sharing is available and in which grades job-sharing is permitted.

(19) The availability of a career break is also an excellent option for parents. As yet, a majority of mothers only avail of it. It is important however, to integrate this into the context of women’s career planning so that it does not simply become a form of early retirement. Staff on career breaks should be kept in contact with developments at work through coming in for seminars or by getting a newsletter. They might also be available to return to work on a job- sharing basis or to do temporary relief work.

Child Care

(20) The state should provide child care facilities at places of work to facilitate the combination of family and working lives. Payment for this service should be proportionate to income, enabling higher paid staff to in part subsidise childcare for lower paid.

(21) Personnel staff in addition, might well assist new parents by compiling lists of reliable childminders and nurseries based on reports from other staff.

(22) This study reveals the key role played by spouses in supporting mothers at work by the sharing of domestic and childcare responsibilities. Women may need more positive support to help them to bring about a more equitable distribution of domestic work and childcare responsibilities. This might be best done by facilitating work based support and discussion groups to raise consciousness among men and women on this issue. In addition dual parenting should be encouraged by offering similar provisions to men and women as regards career breaks, job sharing and flexitime.

Methodology

An initial literature search revealed that there was little research on mothers at work in Ireland, and there was little written on recruitment and promotion in the Civil Service. Due to such a paucity of information, it was decided that an in depth exploratory approach to the subject was required.

In order to compile a sampling frame, I wrote to all Principal Officers in Personnel Sections, or Departmental Secretaries, as appropriate, and asked them for information on the following:

(1)the number of women who are responsible for children i.e. number of mothers and the number of children they have;

(2)their grades and job titles;

(3)whether or not job-sharing is available in the department and if so, the number of women who job share;

(4)the number of women at present on career breaks for childcare purposes;

(5)the number of women with children who retired in the last year;

(6)the availability of flexitime in their respective departments.

The initial response to my first letter was not encouraging, I followed up with a repeat request and this was more successful. From the replies we can get some idea of the extent to which departments employ and facilitate women. (Appendix 1) The tables show the distribution of mothers as given from information often collected on the basis of personal knowledge. Some of the large departments did not reply due to unavailability of data in accessible form and the time it would take to go through card indexes of staff. For those reasons this data is incomplete. One reply was received after the field work had been completed. The lack of a staff data base (which included data on marital status and number of children, in a central section which could be accessed was a major impediment to getting the requested statistics. The data had to be compiled from card indexes and from personal knowledge of personnel staff. For this reason, it is not surprising that the smaller departments found it easier to supply the details requested. Some of the largest departments were unable to supply me with any information. The information received did not include any names or addresses.

The second stage was to compile a list of those I wished to interview. As I did not have a list which I could use as a sampling frame, I had to contact each personnel officer and ask to interview a certain number of respondents in each grade, approximately 10% of those in the lower grades, mothers in the highest grades and a sample of women in the middle grades. I wished to distribute the sample in each department while getting a higher number of lower grade workers as they are the most numerous. I also wanted to include a number of job-sharers. I then told the personnel officer the grade types I wanted to interview and they got the respondents agreement to be interviewed. They also facilitated interview arrangements. The majority of the interviews were conducted in Dublin with a small number conducted in regional offices.

The Interview

A structured interview schedule , administered by the author of this study was used. The interview schedule included questions on the following variables: age, year of recruitment to Civil Service; educational level; work experience; applications for promotions; promotional successes; tranfers; variety of job type; attitudes to work; salary; holidays ; use of flexitime; transport and time taken to and from work; friendship networks; husbands’ occupation and income; number and age of children; childcare arrangements; domestic division of labour ; organisation of household finances; social and leisure activities; perceptions of equal opportunities in the Civil Service; awareness of equal opportunities policy ; career plans ; promotional opportunities ; support for working mothers , and attitudes towards taxation policies as regards childcare. The interviews were tape-recorded and varied in length from forty minutes to ninty minutes. The tapes were sub-sequently transcribed and content analysis was used to extract and compile a composite picture of mothers’ lives. In addition the data was transferred to computer tape and using a data analysis package was analysed to provide frequency counts, cross-tabulations and attitudinal data results. Seventy interviews were analysed in the latter way, which is a very small sample for statistical analysis. The sample size and the manner in which it had to be selected does not lend itself to a more extensive statistical analysis, rather the aim of the research was to identify in an exploratory way the manner in which mothers make decisions about working; the processes of promotion in the Civil Service; Equal Opportunity Policy and the interaction between the domestic and working lives of mothers in the Service.

The interviews were held between September and December of 1988. Respondents were guaranteed anonymity and that is why the report is written up in a way which does not facilitate the identification of any respondents. That is why quotations are not followed by for instance “(Clerical Assistant Dept. of Finance)”, as given the small number of women especially in the higher grades , there might be a risk of indentification. The total sample size of eighty five respondents , seventy taken from those at work and fifteen from those on career breaks might also seem very small. But the eleven women interviewed representing the higher grades from Administrative Officer and above actually constitute a third of the number in the total numbers returned by departmental personnel to me.(c/f table on returns ) Likewise the thirty six respondents taken from the lower grades were drawn from 475 supplied , which if one excludes 236 in agriculture leaves 239 possible respondents. Ideally I would have worked on a sample fraction of 1/10 but that would have entailed over representation of staff in some departments. What was best for my research requirements was to get as wide a distribution of departments as possible, to cover all grades and to include some respondents from regional areas. The study is designed to give an account of the processes of recruitment and promotional procedures as seen by the respondents and to investigate attitudes, lifesyles and experiences of mothers at work in the Civil Service.

Given the way in which the sample had to be drawn up and its total sample size, it was not possible to generalise to the total population using statistical estimates and consequently no attempt is made to generalise beyond the sample. But it is most unlikely that if all mothers in the higher grades were interviewed or if two hundred of those in the lower grades were interviewed, there would be any difference in the findings. The reason for this is that there is very little variation between respondents within the different grades.

Additional data complied for the interim report on equal opportunities by the Dept. of Finance and published in 1988, provided comprehensive statistics on male/female comparisons related to recruitment and promotions helped to set the context of the study. This material is incorporated into Chapter Three of the report and in tables given in the appendices of the report.

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TABLE 2

Female-Male Success Rates at Civil Service Commission Interdepartmental Confined Interview (only) Competitions in 1987

TABLE 3

Female-Male Success Rates at Competitions for the grade of Assistant Secretary and Higher Grades in 1987

5.12The dearth of female candidates for the top posts covered by Table 7 is very apparent. To some extent this is accounted for by the fact that only 5% of the Principal grade is female. It is noteworthy that none of the female candidates for the four specialist posts were successful.

TABLE 4

Female-Male Success Rates at Civil Service Commission Open Written/Interview Competitions in 1987

TABLE 5

Source: Equality of Opportunity in Civil Service: 1st Report

TABLE 5

DISTRIBUTION OF MOTHERS BY GRADE AND DEPARTMENT

Note: F = Flexitime, Y = Yes Available, N = Unavailable

First Y or N refers to availability of flexitime up to AO level, second to availability of flexitime at AP level and above.

Source of data : Departmental returns supplied to author by each department Sept-Dec 1988.

TABLE 6

DIVISION OF LABOUR IN THE HOME

TOTAL NO OF HUSBANDS 68

(One was deceased and the second had deserted his wife)

TABLE 7

DETAILS OF RESPONDENTS’ FAMILIES

Family Size

Age of Eldest Child

Costs of Childcare

17 respondents with children had no formal child care costs:

9 cases children were looked after by grandmothers,

3 cases children were grown up,

1 case the couple work alternative shifts,

2 mothers job-sharing - children at school,

2 fathers look after children

Costs for remainder

£ Per Week

Postscript to the publication of the Report.

Since this report was written, the 1989 report on the implementation of equal opportunities in the Civil Service has been published. (1)

In recruitment to the lower grades, male female success rates were almost proportionate to number of applicants, though men still retained a very slight edge over females in appointments to Executive Officers and Clerical Officers. (Table 4,)

In the recruitment of graduates, however, women were disproportionately unsuccessful in Administrative Officer, Third Secretary , Inspector of Taxes and Executive Officer (Adult) competitions. Table 14 shows that the proportion of females in Administrative Officers posts has declined from 26% in 1987 to 19% in 1989. The proportion of Higher Executive officers who are female has also declined from 34% to 28%, though the latter could be explained by early retirements.

This reports also reveals that in confined departmental competitions, held in ‘88 and ‘89, females has success rates of 55% and 49%. In confined interdepartmental competitions for Higher Executive Officer and Assistant Principal posts, women had equal or higher proportionate success rates. For the posts of Assistant Secretary or above, however, women had zero success rates as compared to 10% and 11% success rates for men in ‘88 and ‘89.

On a very positive note, it is possible to see progressive departments in terms of equal opportunities emerging. Returns for appointments in the Department of Education, Athlone, show women had higher success rates, in Clerical Officer, Executive Officer and Higher Executive Officer posts. (Table 12) This new pattern emerges in returns from Revenue, the Department of Justice and to an extent from the Dept. of Social Welfare in Sligo also. The returns on composition of interview boards (Table 11) shows that these same departments had balanced interview boards in terms of male/female composition.

(1) Equality of Opportunity in the Civil Service. Third Annual Report on the implementation of the Equal opportunity Policy and Guidelines for the Civil Service. Dept. of Finance 1989.