Recent discrimination against women was not intended – but that doesn’t make it excusable
WE’RE told the coronavirus attacks indiscriminately. It ignores class, creed and border.
But that’s not quite true, is it. It’s more likely to be a killer for the elderly and those with underlying health conditions.
We’re told we need to reopen the country quickly.
The Government is stepping up the stages, increasing the distance we can travel and opening retailers earlier than planned.
In so doing, however, it has created a problem bigger than the one it is solving, and just like Covid-19, is doing so by discriminating against a vulnerable group: women.
In particular, low-paid mothers. Just as the virus isn’t intelligent, neither is this deliberate, but it is an unintended consequence.
And like the virus, it is striking at people in a certain category with a weakness: the inability to access childcare.
First it was healthcare workers – overwhelmingly, the nursing population is female. They were so badly needed on the frontline, the Government agreed to find and fund childcare. It failed. The nurses who couldn’t leave their children stayed at home.
Then it was creches. Mingle the kids in play pods, they said. You’ll be fine.
The vast majority of creche workers are women, many on the lowest wages we permit in society. They may seek to disagree with the Government’s approach, but to whom and how do they complain?
Then the teachers. Go back to school, they said. Social distancing will mean you’ll only have each child one or two days a week. It won’t be normal, but c’est la vie.
Teachers, particularly at primary level, are overwhelmingly women, many mothers themselves.
If they return to work, the school part will be confusing enough, but what are they to do with their own children who will also only be in class a couple of days each week?
Pregnant women, thankfully, do not seem to be in the target line of the virus, but they were a bullseye for political leaders.
No mechanism had been considered for those on maternity leave, unable to return to work. No pandemic payment for them. The silent bump genre.
It has since been sorted, but the female mind boggles that nobody had considered them at all.
Many have been unable to drop out of their loved one’s life
We cannot forget carers. The burden of looking after another vulnerable human being whether it be an elderly parent, a disabled child or a sick relative falls, disproportionately, on women, and women who aren’t paid much, if at all.
Many have been unable to drop out of their loved one’s life due to Covid. They have to carry on, exposing both to risk.
Professional carers, in nursing homes and the community, are the frontline workers without whom our death toll would be even more horrendous.
They were ignored for the most part, and when they couldn’t be ignored any longer, were told to get on with it. PPE? We’ll let you know. Training? Hang on, wait until we get the hospitals sorted. Patient isolation? Yep, but you’ll need to isolate too. Rising death toll? Well yes, keep going, we’ll investigate.
Many, of course, are also mothers who may not have seen their own children for weeks or months.
Retailers finally opened their doors to long queues.
On the till and stacking the shelves are a lot of women, low paid and in dire need of the hours. They are forbidden from staying at home, collecting their social welfare while a job is waiting. What are they to do?
Granny is out of the picture. The childminder can’t visit. The creche can’t open. The schools remain shut. Discrimination, as we are learning across the globe, takes many forms and is often unintentional, inadvertent and accidental.
None of which makes it excusable.