The Rights Of Man

FAMILY COURTS - WHEN OPEN DOES NOT NECESSARILY MEAN OPEN

There has been much debate (link, link) about whether the landmark change in allowing accredited journalists into the UK's family law courts will make much difference.

The reason for the concern has been about the fact that judges can still stop journalists from reporting what they see and hear and also from attending in the first place.

Some of the outrageous judgements made by judges on custody issues and the enforcement of custody orders means that they themselves can still hide behind many of their absurd views. This also helps to protect the inept and bias against fathers by Cafcass and Social Services.

Another concern is that because of the savage cutbacks in the local media, apart from any very serious cases, there are not enough reporters to cover the courts. Many a journalist cut their teeth as a court reporter for a local paper but these newspapers can no longer keep such posts going and nearly all such positions have gone. It means that apart from this week and perhaps in an outrageous/serious case, the interest in this issue by local papers will wane.

At least there is some transparency but it is doubtful there will be a change in attitude on custodial/parenting issues when the judges who make the rules up as they go along still have the power to hide and be unaccountable. There will still be no justice.

Coverage from the the Times, who won awards for opening up the secret family courts is here (1, 2, 3. Other coverage includes (Press Gazette, Families Need Fathers, Daily Mail, Daily Mail 2, BBC, Guardian, Independent)

HARMAN'S EQUALITIES BILL MEANS OPEN SEASON ON MEN AND THEIR LIVELIHOODS

Harriet Harman introduced the Equalities Bill (link, link, briefing) into the UK's House of Commons today.

The main areas of concern and ones raised on this site a number of times is around the gender pay gap (employment section) and the positive action (link) proposals (no such thing as positive action as it means negative action for someone else).

With male unemployment higher than female unemployment (link, link) pressure on businesses and a willful abuse of the gender pay gap statistics, what in reality Harman has done is declare an employment war on men.

Her intentions are clear.

Companies will be forced to publish their gender pay statistics and this is with the sole intention of shaming employers, no matter what rational explanation.

British Aerospace (BAE) for example, said at the weekend that they have a large gender pay gap because their highest paid employees are engineers who are predominately male. They have female engineers but fewer of them so their gender pay gap will be large but this is not down to discrimination especially when they want more female engineers. BAE, according to Harman and her acolytes though, want to place BAE in the stocks and put them through some grotesque Stalinesque show trial.

She said "You have got to believe that either women are 20 per cent less intelligent, less hard-working, less committed to their job, less experienced, less qualified, or you have got to believe that there is structural pay discrimination. We believe there is structural pay discrimination."

 No one as ever said this, it is down to lifestyle choices and career decisions. 

The other issue is that the positive action issues are clearly designed to discriminate against men. The legislation will be gender neutral but its interpretation by the courts, lawyers and HR staff will not be. The intention of the bill is clear - it is discriminate against men.

The bill says that companies can choose one person above another because of their gender when the two candidates are equally qualified. Quota's will also be introduced for companies bidding for public sector wo.

Firstly, it is virtually impossible for two candidates to be equally qualified especially after interview and any other testing. It is mischievous to suggest differently.

Secondly, in the current climate with more men on the dole queue they could be denied a job solely on the basis of their gender. This is discrimination.

Lastly, if a man is discriminated against (and could be from a working class background and studiously made his way up the ladder), it will not just be him who loses out, it could be his daughter, his wife/girlfriend and mother. That will go down well as those women will be equally discriminated against but it is being done in their name.

The Bill, if it passes, and it is likely to, is open season on men and will enshrine discrimination in law against them. Don't anyone think differently

It is the culmination of three decades of anti-male propaganda and male bashing. The nightmare is coming true.

Media Coverage so far (Daily Mail 1 plus debate, Melanie Phillips, BBC, Metro, Telegraph) and more will emerge over the week.

NEW RESEARCH SHOWS BOYS PERFORM BETTER IN ENGLISH IN SINGLE-SEX CLASSES

Significant research from Steven Proud of Bristol University shows that boys perform better at English when there are fewer girls in the class, especially at primary school (5-11 year olds).

His report Girl Power?, though published in January 2008, seems to have some media leverage as he was talking about it at a Royal Economic Society's conference earlier this week.The report was covered in the British media (BBC, Guardian, Telegraph, Daily Mail).

As stated in the Guardian piece "Boys' English grades are up to a tenth worse when high numbers of girls are in the class with them, though girls' grades are unaffected. Boys do worse in English when there are girls in their class, researchers will say today, contradicting the widely held belief that girls are always a good influence on boys in school."

What Mr Proud is essentially saying is that English should be taught in single-sex classes because boys perform worse in the subject when there are girls present.

He suggests it "there are several possible reasons why boys do not perform well in mixed English classes. One is that if the majority of pupils are girls, the teacher uses learning techniques that are more suited to girls than boys. In addition, a class could be seen to be performing at an acceptable level overall, but boys are being overlooked and left behind."

What it shows is that there are reasons why boys fare less well than girls at English. This site (section and article) has long advocated more widespread single-sex schools/classes and the re-introduction of O-levels (also keeping GSCEs) as one way of tackling boys underachievement. Boys results in English are a long way behind those for girls (link). 

Nearly all education specialists, local eductaion authorities, the Government and others continue to fail do anything much about this. Here is more evidence that shows soemthing can be done to prevent  another generation of boy's falling behind.

There is always one intransigent voice (in the Guardian article) and this is provided by Professor Alan Smithers, director of the Centre for Education and Employment Research at the University of Buckingham. He said "Boys might be discouraged by how well girls are doing in English," he said, "but that still does not explain why they would do better in maths and science with a higher proportion of girls in their class.

"This is one study, among many, which detects very small differences between boys and girls. But you can't say that it means boys or girls should be separated. It has very little practical importance for schools."

It of course does have a practical significance on boys and they are the ones that count, not the institutions, which are supposedly there to support all pupils. That's what we pay taxes for.

What is he proposing, that we not bother to help boys and it is untrue that there are very small differences between boys and girls. He doesn't bother looking at the exam results then.

OPENING UP FAMILY COURTS A 'CON TRICK'

The last post welcomed the outline proposal to open up the family courts to the media. It would seem according to the analysis by John Hemming MP (link) and Marcel Berlins (link) that all is not what it seems.

In many respects, what these two commentators have revealed is worse, because at least before there was no pretence of openness, now the judiciary and Government can say there is, when there is not.

Very Orwellian but is anyone surprised?

Hat-tip: Mensaid

BREAKTHROUGH ON OPENING FAMILY COURTS UP TO THE MEDIA

One of the biggest complaints made about the UK's Family Courts System is the fact that because the media are not allowed access, they are unaccountable and not transparent. Basically, it all goes on behind closed doors and there is no scrutiny, and therefore justice is not being seen to be done. There is no public confidence.

The Government has been well aware of this and has been lobbied by the media (link) and groups such as Families Need Fathers for this transparency.

At last, the Government (link) looks like it will deliver and they are measures now before Parliament to allow accredited media into the family court system. Fingers crossed it goes through.

HAMPSHIRE SOCIAL SERVICES CASE SHOW HOW ANTI-MALE VIEWS INFEST SOCIETY

In a story revealed by the UK's Daily Mail (link) earlier this month, it is clear how constant male bashing and the undermining of men shows itself in reality. Every day it happens in the family courts system and by no means are social services immune. It was also covered in the Daily Echo (link)

The story of how Hampshire Social Services staff causally believed that a child could be a victim of shaken baby syndrome because the father (of course) was male and a soldier is quite sickening.

The problem is that these people in Hampshire's Social Services department are immune from any scrutiny or accountability. The councillors running the council should be on the case but there will met a Berlin Wall protected by a code of Omerta.

The people making this comment should be sacked, but they would only find a job elsewhere and would probably be snapped up. I wonder if they thought their own fathers must have been violent because they were men.

EQUALITIES COMMISSION TURMOIL NEEDS TO CLOSELY WATCHED

The beady eyes of the media have started to look into what is happening at the UK's Equalities and Human Rights Commission (link) which was established in October 2007 as the Equal Opportunities Commission, Race Commission and Disabilities Commission merged.

The Commission is pivotal (link) not in dealing with discrimination cases but also, just like the Equal Opportunities Commission, in pushing a pro-female agenda which often is discriminatory against men or just ignores the needs of men altogether. Hardly any pronouncements or studies are produced into looking health or domestic violence issues, though from time to time it has made pronouncements about boys education and fathers rights, it never really follows these up in the same way it does for women (see yesterday's report).

It is therefore vital for all those wanting equality for men to monitor what it does and says especially as to whether it truly believes in equality and will actively enforce the Gender Equality Duty in helping men obtain the public services they are entitled to.

The media's digging has revealed that:-

Huge turmoil in the way that it is runs including high profile resignations such as the Chief Executive Nicola Brewer and bitter infighting. All revealed in gory detail in The Independent. Other coverage can be found here (Guardian, The Times, Guardian2, Daily Mail).

Salaries soar by 25% in two years with the Conservatives accusing the Commission of "abusing taxpayers" (The Sun). The Sun also revealed it costs £22.7 million more than the previous three bodies (now £70 million). It employs 514 people.

A Freedom of Information request (link) by a SJS Jackson shows that two in every three employees  are female (66% women - 34% men). Under the old Equal Opportunities Commission the figures were 85% women and 15% men and it is likely that the proportions working on gender issues are the same.

What these stories show is that an internecine turf war is going on within the Commission, which is not uncommon considering three distinct bodies merged together.

Whatever happens, pressure needs to be maintained to make sure they remember that equality also means equality for men. The fear is that if the ultra PC brigade win, there will be even less attention on men and more calls for more bias against them. The report on the City's Gender Pay Gap is one such example of this happening.

THE WAR ON THE CITY'S GENDER PAY GAP IGNITES THE DISCRIMINATION CHARGE

In February, the site commented that the review led by the Equalities Commission into the City of London's pay gap was nothing more than showtrial designed as a ruse to attack men (link). The way the initial findings have been skewed by the Commission and others show that prediction to be prescient.

The initials findings (link) show that pay gaps in the City reach up to 60% and the quotes from Trevor Phillips scream " The figures we’re releasing today are shocking and indicate just how serious the pay gap has become in the financial sector, with women concentrated in lower paid, lower skilled roles and few able to make it to the top. The truth is that however you look at the numbers, women do not have equal status or equal rewards."

Never one to miss out on a bit of male bashing, Harriet Harman, minister for women and equality, said in the Guardian (link) that the inquiry "proves that the finance sector is a breeding ground for discrimination and unfairness" and promised "tough new measures" in the equality bill.

Except it doesn't...

What the research from the National Institute of Social and Economic Research (link) shows is that

• Twice as many men have degrees than women (39% to 20%)
• There are more women than men in admin/secretarial jobs
• Men undertake more unpaid overtime than women
• Working conditions are less family friendly than on in other professions

Whilst it shows that for many women, the attractiveness of the City is not as high as that for for men, but that does not mean there is sexual or gender discrimination. There is no proof that a women with the same skills, experience, working the same hours, in the same job with the same company earns less than a man.

In addition, many women choose to work in the relatively lower paid public sector than men and the Commission does not prove that there are any barriers to entry for any women wanting to work in the same way as men. In addition, of course, many women want to take time off to look after children.

The City may not be family friendly which means for some it is not women-friendly but that does not mean there is active discrimination. It also does not mean as Trevor Phillips contends that women do not have equal status.

The headlines and comments from politicians and the Commission has to recognise that and also have they asked women if they would like to work in the City?

The showtrial is gathering pace and the outcome is just another stick to beat the City with. And as Harman says, there will be tough measures in the forthcoming Equalities Bill, which means more positive discrimination (no such thing as positive discrimination means negative discrimination for someone else), which therefore means that some men will be denied a chance to work in the City, soley because of their gender.

KEVIN MYERS EXPOSES IRELAND'S NATIONAL WOMEN'S COUNCIL

Although this site is mainly about the UK, it is useful to see what is going on elsewhere, especially across the Irish Sea. Kevin Myers in a very perceptive article in Ireland's Independent newspaper has an exposed Ireland's National Women's Council where he explains how they wanted the Irish Government to put women and children first in their budget. Read the article here.

With the UK Government's Budget due on Wednesday 22nd April, watch with interest how the Equalities Commission, Fawcett Society and others, repeat the trick. With the Labour Government so far behind in the polls, this could be the last Labour budget and these organisations will do all they can to pressurise the Government to help women but not help men, when of course, they should be helping both.

DID THIS MEDIA COMPANY BREAK THE SEX DISCRIMINATION ACT?

There was an article in the UK's Daily Mail this week (link), where Samantha Brick set up a media company that only employed women. It went bankrupt but her aim was "...to achieve my Utopian dream - a female- only company with happy, harmonious workers benefiting from an absence of men. "

One issue that was not picked up was whether setting up this media company with such a recruitment policy actually broke the  Sex Discrimination Act (1975) (link). The Act does allow for gender-only discrimination but only in specific circumstances, normally around issues of vulnerable people or where there is an obvious reason.

However, a media company would not fit into that category. As far as can be seen the policy of only recruiting women broke the Act and therefore was operating illegally. Any man who applied for a job with this company and was turned down because of his gender would have won a case in the civil courts.

Because it was a woman-only company, it is not challenged but if it was a male-only company then this point would have been made, such is the double standards.

The question is, how many other companies out there that purposely only recruit women and not men? And are proud of it!