Companies may be required to report on their progress to get more women into the boardroom, under proposals announced by the Government today.

It comes as new research shows that sixty per cent of people think there are not enough women directors in big businesses. The survey, commissioned by the Government Equalities Office for International Women’s Day,  shows that half believe there will be equal numbers of men and women directors within the next 20 years. However, the Government believes the reality is that it will take 60 years for women to gain equal representation on the boards of top 100 companies at the current rate of progress.

The Government has asked the Financial Reporting Council to consider including a new principle in its code of conduct to require firms to report on what they’re doing to increase the number of women in senior management positions. This builds on the Equality Bill which will allow companies to choose to use positive action to appoint more women to senior roles.

Other findings from the survey include:

- A clear majority (80%) think a balanced senior management team will be better at understanding their customers.

- Nearly two thirds (61%) believe businesses are losing out on talent by having fewer women in senior roles.

- More than three quarters (78%) disagree that, because men have more experience in senior management than women, men are better at running companies.

- Nearly three quarters (72%) think it is important that women and men should have an equal say in the business decisions over how the British economy is run.

- More than half (55%) think both men and women should share decisions in the finance sector which affect the economy. Only 7% think decisions should be left just to men.

- 71% believe having more women on senior management teams will lead to more family friendly working practices.

- More than half (59%) think that having senior management teams of all one sex will be more likely to think in the same way (‘groupthink’).

- Just under half (43%) think there should be an equal balance of both men and women in investment banking.

The Prime Minister Gordon Brown hosted a business breakfast at Downing Street with leading women in business, to mark International Women’s Day and to  discuss the opportunities and challenges facing women's leadership in business and enterprise.

Brown said:"We all recognise the value of strong role models for women in all walks of life – and there are many in politics, the arts, public services, sport and the third sector.

But there are too few in Britain’s boardrooms. When more than half of graduates are women, it is completely unacceptable that some of our top 100 companies have not a single woman on their boards - and that none at all have a majority of women on their boards.”

He warned: “If we do not see a dramatic change in the composition of company boards in the future, we will need to consider taking more serious action to ensure that companies recruit from the diverse pool of exceptional talent we have in the UK.”

Harriet Harman, Minister Women and Equalities, said:"Britain needs more women in the boardroom. This survey shows that the public want a quicker pace of change. Government is playing its part, but firms need to play their part to.

"Too many British boardrooms are still no-go areas for women. Women are important consumers and employees. We’ll never get a proper meritocracy or truly family-friendly workplaces from male dominated boards.

"Businesses that run on the basis of an old boy network and do not draw on the talents of all the population will not be the ones that flourish and prosper in the 21st century."

Currently, only one in ten FTSE board directors are women, and 25 firms have no women on them at all. Women continue to be under-represented at board level despite having the right education and experience they need to succeed, and are deterred from applying due to corporate boards being dominated by “old boys’ networks”.

Steps the Government is taking to support women in business include:

The Equality and Human Rights Commission is producing recommendations shortly on how to further tackle sex discrimination in the finance sector, following an inquiry last year that found only one tenth (11%) of senior managers were women.

 

Britain’s gender pay gap is higher than the European average, according to a survey by the European Commission.

It shows that the pay gap between men and women across Europe is on average 18%, compared to a UK average of 21%.

The Commission announced plans to significantly reduce the gap over the next five years.

The data is based on gross hourly earnings. The UK has the ninth highest pay gap of the 27 countries studied, while Estonia has a 30% gap. Italy has the lowest gap at just 4.9%.

The Commission will publish a five-year gender equality plan in the second half of this year and is looking at areas like increasing transparency in company pay between men and women and enforcing gender neutral job classifications and pay scales.

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Grandparents who provide childcare for low paid parents are risking financial hardship themselves, a new report from Grandparents Plus and the Equality and Human Rights Commission shows.

The report “Protect, Support, Provide” reveals that grandparents, particularly working age, working class grandmothers, in families most at risk of poverty are under increasing pressure to take on a caring role. Many have given up work or reduced their hours to care for grandchildren. This has an impact on household income and may have an effect on a grandparent’s pension rights as well as their health.
 
The report warns that two of the government’s aims are working in conflict with each other – increasing the numbers of lone parents in work and increasing the employment rate of older people as they approach retirement – as grandparents are providing free childcare instead of being at work themselves.  This, it says, could undermine attempts to reduce both child and older people’s poverty.

The research shows:

Sam Smethers, Chief Executive of Grandparents Plus, said: “It’s time the government recognised that grandparents provide the last line of defence between millions of children and that poverty line. They need recognition and better emotional, financial and practical support.”

Kay Carberry, Commissioner at the Equality and Human Rights Commission, said: “We’re making a number of recommendations to government, based on the findings of this report. These include extending the right to request flexible working to all employees so that it is easier for grandparents to balance their work and care commitments, abolishing the default retirement age and looking in more detail at the economic contribution of grandparents. 

The Daycare Trust backs the call for increased flexible working for all and for children’s centres to provide more support for grandparents. However, it says that, at a time when public sector finances are stretched, it would prefer to see more investment in childcare across the board rather than money being put into tax credits for grandpapers. It will publish a policy paper ‘Listening to grandparents’ later this month, a piece of research carried out with grandparents sharing their experiences and views on childcare.

Charities call for childcare to be placed at centre of London elections

 

An online programme to help mums in business get support and solve their business problems has been launched by leading mumpreneurs author Antonia Chitty.

The Mumpreneur Guide Business Programme is an online programme that mums running a business can access at any time through the internet. It allows mums to work on modules on issues such as business finance, marketing and sales and provides support in developing businesses.

Antonia says: "Each month you can flag up areas that you need input and I'll help you work through your particular blockages. The programme offers incisive questions that can make you think about your business in a new way."

There are a limited number of free trials for the Mumpreneur Guide Business Programme available each month. Clickhere for more information.

Women who work part time are likely to have healthier children than those who work full time or not at all, an Australian study has found.
The study is being used to push the case for more flexible working.

The research 'Do Working Mothers Raise Couch Potato Kids?', by academics from the University of New England in New South Wales, shows that children whose mothers work part time eat less junk food, watch less television and are less likely to be overweight or obese.
The study of over 4,500 Australian pre-school children found children of part-time mums watched an hour less of television a week than those of mums who worked full time or did not work at all. They also ate less snack food, were exposed to less junk food advertising and took more exercise.
The research will be published in the international journal Social Sciences & Medicine next month.

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Asian law firms offering more flexible working

Asian law firms are increasingly offering flexible working, including working from home, according to a report in ALB Legal News.

As firms cut or freeze salaries, the option of flexible working is being promoted more, says the newspaper, which corresponds to the results of a poll held to find out what employees want from their workplace.

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The majority of working parents are not planning a summer holiday this year, according to a poll by workingmums.co.uk.

The poll of 300 working parents, sponsored by Eurocamp, found that 32% said they were not taking a holiday this summer. This compared with 25% who had already booked, 20% who planned to book in the next couple of months and 15% who were planning to wait for last minute bargains.

The results of the poll seem to go against latest figures from the travel industry association Abta for the general population which show a 27% increase in bookings at the start of February compared with the same time last year.

TUI Travel, which owns Thomson, First Choice and luxury holiday provider Hayes & Jarvis, is reported to have increased the number of package deals it is offering to meet increased demand.

A previous poll by workingmums.co.uk suggests parents are cutting back on luxuries to beat the recession. A poll of 1,650 parents found almost 50% said they had reduced spending on holidays in the last six months.

The Government is worried about the cost implications of EU plans to extend maternity leave to 20 weeks, with six weeks on full pay.

The UK allows women a year off, with six weeks on 90% pay and 33 weeks on statutory maternity pay of £123 a week.

The Government says the UK already has a generous system and predicts the changes, voted by the European Parliament, could cost an extra £2bn.

Sarah Jackson, Chief Executive of Working Families said: “Yesterday's vote in favour of 20 weeks of maternity pay on full pay from Brussels is an ambition that we would endorse.  Evidence shows that finances dictate when low paid women return to work.  Apart from the first six weeks, the UK pays women less than the national minimum wage in SMP.  This sends a poor message about the best start in life for low income families.  The idea that this would have an impact on employability should be knocked on the head:  in the UK the state - not the employer - pays SMP.   We're also pleased to hear EU talking about paternity pay - over 40% of fathers don't take any paternity leave at all, the majority because they can't afford it and this needs addressing urgently."