Why women do not work in railway

[theironroad]

Just checking the calendar with some of these replies to make sure it is 2017 not 1917.

Aslef ran a campaign a few years ago about the lack of female drivers,which at the time nationally was about 2-3%.

Tocs and focs and the unions need to to get it together and realise that the lack of female drivers is a problem in a country where the gender spilt is roughly 50/50.

Any PNB point in the country that doesn't haven't at least unisex facilities is a disgrace and it would probably help that the actual and hidden sexism that still occurs in messroom banter is challenged as well.

 

[otomous]

Just checking the calendar with some of these replies to make sure it is 2017 not 1917.

Aslef ran a campaign a few years ago about the lack of female drivers,which at the time nationally was about 2-3%.

Tocs and focs and the unions need to to get it together and realise that the lack of female drivers is a problem in a country where the gender spilt is roughly 50/50.

Any PNB point in the country that doesn't haven't at least unisex facilities is a disgrace and it would probably help that the actual and hidden sexism that still occurs in messroom banter is challenged as well.

ASLEF are extremely active in addressing the gender imbalance. However they don’t recruit drivers, the TOCs do.

PNB points have toilets for men and women. Doesn’t mean there are adequate toilets elsewhere on the network. You’re only guaranteed one trip to a PNB point a day.

 

[choochoochoo]

Ok going slightly off topic, but there is still a physical element to the job. Admittedly not as frequent a requirement as previously, but as anybody who has tried to detach/fit shraeder hoses to sockets or attempted manual uncoupling may have discovered, these can require quite a bit of brute force.

Yes. There are several men out there who also may struggle to do these tasks too, and am sure numerous ladies who could, I'm just saying there is still grunt work sometimes.

Reminds me of something highlighted to me by a medical friend. Look at the majority of orthopaedic surgeons. Mainly men. Because a lot of those surgical procedures also require brute force.

I'd certainly like to see a more mixed workforce when it came to gender. Just wanted to highlight a possible factor

 

[FGW_DID]

Why would railfreight.com have an article about about primary school teachers? It's not axe-grinding to raise a gender disparity. You rightly raised the issue of significant under representation of men in teaching posts, particularly at primary level. That's not axe-grinding either.

When the public react to train crew pay discussions with 'what about nurses etc' we tend to respond that the fact that they are underpaid doesn't mean we can't fight for a pay rise. It's not too dissimilar a thing here - the fact that men are underrepresented in primary schools doesn't mean it's ok for women to be underrepresented on the railway.

If it was about education, I doubt ‘railfreight.com’ would have covered it however my point is that the vast majority of these type of articles that throw phrases round like ‘gender disparity’, ‘gender equality’ and ‘gender balance’ are only about “bemoaning the lack of women in certain types of career” and usually written by a woman. If people want to write an article about equality and balance perhaps they should include some in their article!

Just checking the calendar with some of these replies to make sure it is 2017 not 1917.

Aslef ran a campaign a few years ago about the lack of female drivers,which at the time nationally was about 2-3%.

Tocs and focs and the unions need to to get it together and realise that the lack of female drivers is a problem in a country where the gender spilt is roughly 50/50.

Any PNB point in the country that doesn't haven't at least unisex facilities is a disgrace and it would probably help that the actual and hidden sexism that still occurs in messroom banter is challenged as well.

“The lack of female drivers is a problem”

Why?

Are men and women actively being stopped from certain job roles? If it is, that’s the problem. Face it, some roles will always attract more men than women and vice versa, is it really such a problem? As you pointed out this is the 21st century, if you want a job, go for it, if you get it and find you are the only member of your gender in that workplace, as long as you get treated equally then all good!

Do we really need all these ‘quotas’, where do we stop?