Published: 15 Dec 2010
MUA women join rally for equal pay at Town Hall Sydney.
MUA women, led by Mich-Elle Myers, joined unions and community rallying today around the nation in support of equal pay for women.
And they won.
After a concerted campaign the federal government has agreed to put equal pay for women above the budget bottom line. But not before the intervention of the Prime Minister, Julia Gillard.
A controversial government submission to the equal pay test case being heard by Fair Work Australia has now been superceded by a letter from the Workplace Minister, Chris Evans, the Sydney Morning Herald reports.
It's a test case of the new law that enshrines equal pay for comparable work and aims to lift wages in female-dominated industries.
Unions argued the government should support the case, covering 153,000, mostly female, ASU community sector workers.
The Australian Services Union, wrote to set the record on five issues that had upset the sector, including refuting an argument by the Australian Industry Group that sector wages should instead be lifted through workplace bargaining, not a gender case.
"The gender pay gap should not be tolerated, it's 2010 and if women are still earning less than men it is a national disgrace" said Mich-Elle Myers, MUA backing the equal wages campaign.
It is unacceptable that full-time working women earn 18 per cent less than men or almost $1 million less over a lifetime and are two and a half times more likely to live in poverty in their old age.
