Women's Rights and Gender Inequality in Law: UK Legislation and Cases

This report provides an overview of gender inequality faced by women in the legal field. It begins with an introduction to the historical context of gender roles and discrimination, highlighting the ongoing challenges women encounter in society and the workplace. The report then delves into related legislations, specifically focusing on the UK's legal framework, including the Sex Discrimination Act, the Equality Act 2010, and other relevant acts aimed at protecting women's rights. Several case laws are analyzed, such as Croft v Royal Mail group PLC and Merchant vs BT, to illustrate how these legislations are applied and interpreted in practice. The analysis covers issues such as discrimination in employment, equal pay, and gender reassignment. The report concludes by emphasizing the importance of gender equality, women's rights, and access to justice for broader societal development.

Running head: REPORT 0
WOMEN IN LAW, SOCIETY AND CONTROVERSY
FEBRUARY 24, 2020
STUDENT DETAILS:

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Contents
Introduction and background.......................................................................................................................2
Related legislations......................................................................................................................................2
Case laws.....................................................................................................................................................4
Conclusion...................................................................................................................................................6
References...................................................................................................................................................7

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Introduction and background
The Women have been minority and the men have been dominant gender from the long time.
The women are facing gender inequality from the long time. The women have not many rights
like men. The gender inequality is considered as imbalanced and unfair treatment between the
two sexual categories. The people take gender inequality for granted. This is accepted and
appeared so normal in the society. It is very serious issue of the society. The women face gender
discrimination in daily life in everything from as well as politics. History has shown us that the
roles and responsibilities for men and women were already chosen for them. In UK, there was
tendency of men supremacy in the employment until World War II wherever the females got
men-orientated work for first time while males struggled in a front line. Prior to this, the males
were the wage earners for the families. Alternatively, the females were worked as
homemakersand looked after the children. The rate of employment was around 70 % for women
and 79% for men in UK. According to Office of National Statistics, 2008, this rate was same
since 1999. It can say that the women empowerment is acute facet of getting gender equality. It
is essential to ensure gender equality in the society. The gender equality increases the sense of
self-worth of women. It is also helpful in providing powers to take decisions. It also ensures
access to the means, and controlling over the life. In the following parts, the issue of gender
inequality faced by women is discussed and examined. This report also discusses the related
legislations and case laws.
Related legislations
The justice as well as law entities have significant role to play in developing and hindering
gender equality. These organisations consider the social, legal along with financial differences in

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women and men. It is helpful to know that how they experience justice along with laws in their
life. Additionally, it also considers how the daily experience of justice along with law
simultaneously creates manners of the legal, financial along with social endowment. It can say
that men as well as women face same challenges in accessing the justice (Mehta, 2016). These
challenges can be the distance from justice service provider, higher cost as well as poor
infrastructure. However, there are more obstacles for the women. A lack of legal guarantee and
presence of uneven or gender blind legal provision in the different areas of world, like the field
of labour, properties and personal status laws hinder the access to justice by women.
Furthermore, the capability of women to access justice mechanism, such as courts, legal aid
clinics, and administrative bodies, can also be limited because of the social factors, financial
factors and psychological factors as well as the educational factors among others. UK had always
supported gender equality in the public policy as well as representation at democratic
organisations. The government has enacted several legislations regarding gender discrimination,
both personal as well as institutional, at workstation. It can see that the gender discrimination is
illegal. The government of United Kingdom had declared certain equality legislations. These
legislations are helpful in strengthening the position of women. The Sexual Offences Act and the
Crime and Victims Act ensure the better security for victim. They also impose harsh penalties for
the criminals.Moreover, the Sex Discrimination Act of 1975 provides security to women from
being discriminated against in employment, amenities, education, vocational training, education,
as well as of public functions because of the sexual category. This act was amended by Sex
Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act 2002. The Sex Discrimination (Gender Reassignment)
Regulations 1999 secures the right of people who wish to experience, are experiencing, and have

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experienced the sex movement. This regulation pertains to make payment and dealing in self-
employment, employment as well as occupational preparation.
Additionally, the Equal Pay Act of 1970 commands equal payment for the equal
work irrespective of the sexual category. The Equality Act introduced the gender equality duty in
2007.It requires that public authorities should encourage equality between women as well as men
in all the aspects of life. It also eliminates discrimination and harassment between men and
women. The Gender Equality Duty will be helpful in encouraging the great transparency
amongst contractors of private sector to provide the equality target. In this way, the Equality Act
2006 and the Equality Act 2010 served to codify and combine all equality representations in
Great Britain. It renders equivalent protection across the aspects of equality. It can see that the
Equality Act also excludes victimisation or unfavourable treatment. It also
encourages equality through incomplete positive obligations (Blau, 2016).
Case laws
Croft v Royal Mail group PLC [2003] EWCA Civ 1045 is a famous case. In the case of Croft v
Royal Mailgroup PLC [2003] EWCA Civ 1045, the Employment Appeal Tribunal considered
that pre-operative male was a man and therefore there was no discrimination in preventing use of
a female toilet. The Court of Appeal adopted indirect approach. It was held by the Court of
Appeal that the gender re-assignment protection included all the securities of reassignment in
medical administration. However, it was appropriate to restrict utilisation of the toilet of female
for the period at the time of which Ms Croft could utilisecommon toilet. This rationalmethod left
open in what circumstances pre-operative male-to-female transsexual can utilise the amenities of
females with Court of Appeal declaring that the workers are required to be flexible. With
exclusion of requirements of medical supervision and with no clear direction under the Equality

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Act the issues of at what point do protection begin are still left open to interpretation by the
worker.In the case of R (Winder and ors) v Sandwell Borough Council (Commission
intervener) [2015] EWHC 44, the two-years residency requirements of local authority for
council tax reduction indirectly discriminates against women escaping domestic viciousness. The
Council violated the equality duty of public sector. Additionally, P & S v Cornwall Council,
Case C-13/94, [1996] IRLR 34 7 suggests “the dismissal of a transsexual for the reasons related
to the gender re-assignment should be considered as contrary to Article 5(1) ofInstruction” can
still render opportunities for the non-binary individual (Stewart, 2017).
Furthermore, the menopause is also inclusive in the Equality Act 2010. In the case of Merchant
vs BT [2012] ET/140135/11, Ms Merchant (employee)made tribunal claim against BT
(employer) on basis of gender discrimination. The performance of Merchant was being affected
because of the menopausal signs. Her GP provided evidence describing the signs. Merchant was
suffering from depression. The employee got worst level of concentration (Jackson,
2018).Therefore, the performance process required managers to examine the reason of
underperformance. The managers were required to assess whether it was because of the issue of
health (Bucknor, et. al, 2018). However, the line manager did not considerimpacts of menopause.
The line manager also did not ask for the opinions of expert. The manager considered only own
experience in relation tothe menopause. The manager failed to consider the evidence or seek
proper suggestion of expert.The corporation terminated. In return, Merchant made claim in
tribunal. They supported her claims on a ground that the manager will not have approached the
non-female-related conditions in the similar manner. It was found by tribunal that the employer
would have treated the man suffering from same signs in the different manner (Naidu and Chand,
2017).

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Conclusion
As per the above analysis, it can be concluded that assuring the rights of females and rendering
opportunities to get complete potential, is dangerous not only for getting gender equality, but
also for getting the wider range of international development objectives. It is found that the
empowered females render great contribution to effectivenessas well as health of the nation,
families and community. The gender equality is considered as human right. However, in the
present world there is constant gap in access to opportunity between men and women. It is
concluded that the gender discrimination often results is resulted into lower-wage jobs. In this
way, the women can be affected by favouritism, poverty and mistreatment. Moreover, the law
are pervasive and affect different facets of the people. It is clear that the access to justice is
significant for the gender equality. The reason is that it enables impartial enjoyment of the
complete scope of means as well as rights. The justice along with law organisations have
significant role in the allocation of the resources as well as rights amongst the men and women.

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References
Blau, F.D., (2016) Gender, inequality, and wages. OUP Catalogue.
Bucknor, A., Kamali, P., Phillips, N., Mathijssen, I., Rakhorst, H., Lin, S.J. and Furnas, H.,
(2018) Gender inequality for women in plastic surgery: a systematic scoping review. Plastic and
reconstructive surgery, 141(6), pp.1561-1577.
Croft v Royal Mail group PLC [2003] EWCA Civ 1045
Jackson, R.M. (2018) Inequality, Gender. Core Concepts in Sociology, p.141.
Mehta, H., (2016) October. Gender Inequality and Women Inequity-Deficiency in Human Rights
Approach and Religious Personal Laws. In Proceedings of 1st Virtual Conference on United
Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
Merchant vs BT [2012] ET/140135/11
Naidu, S. and Chand, A. (2017) National culture, gender inequality and women’s success in
micro, small and medium enterprises. Social Indicators Research, 130(2), pp.647-664.
P & S v Cornwall Council, Case C-13/94, [1996] IRLR 34 7
R (Winder and ors) v Sandwell Borough Council (Commission intervener) [2015] EWHC 44
Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act 2002

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Stewart, A.L., (2017) Men’s collective action willingness: Testing different theoretical models of
protesting gender inequality for women and men. Psychology of Men & Masculinity, 18(4),
p.372.
The Crime and Victims Act
The Sex Discrimination Act 1975
The Sexual Offences Act
The Equality Act 2010