Women’s equality in the UK – A health check

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Budget. 34 The subsequent budgets have done nothing to redress that imbalance. (See Article 13
for more information)
We welcome the fact that the Government published for the first time, an equalities overview
document, alongside the Spending Review 2010. 35 However, the Government lacks the common
datasets across all departments to allow them to model the impact of policy proposals on
different groups for every area of policy, and there continues to be an absence of gender
disaggregated data in key areas of expenditure. 36
Recommendations:
• We call upon the Government to improve its capacity to conduct gender impact
assessments; and to go beyond piecemeal analysis of each measure, and assess
economic strategy as a whole from a gender equality perspective
• Gender responsive budgeting should be mandatory for all national and local
Government departments and public bodies
Gender analysis in HM Treasury and tax revenue
There is no equality impact statement in the HM Treasury and Department for Business,
Innovation and Skills joint document Plan for Growth, 37 published alongside the Budget.
In evidence under the EHRC’s Section 31 assessment 38 the Women’s Budget Group 39 noted that
the methods used by the Treasury to conduct its distributional impact analysis, differentiating
households by levels of income, could have been used to differentiate households by their
gendered characteristics. This would have alerted the Treasury to the fact that the households
hardest hit (proportionate to their incomes) by the expenditure cuts, were lone parents (95%
of whom are women) and single female pensioners, two groups that are already subject to
multiple disadvantages.
The Government is providing millions in tax reductions and tax breaks for business, but men
stand to gain more from these measures than women, as they outnumber women in ownership
of shares and businesses. (See Appendix: 2 for further information)
Recommendation:
There should be a single point of government responsible for monitoring and
assessing the cumulative impact of future Spending Reviews and Budgets alongside
independent and authoritative equality analysis of public spending
34. See Stratton, A. (2010) ‘Women will bear brunt of budget cuts, says Yvette Cooper’, The Guardian, 4th July 2010 http://www.guardian.
co.uk/politics/2010/jul/04/women-budget-cuts-yvette-cooper
35. HM Treasury (2010) Spending Review October 2010 http://cdn.hm-treasury.gov.uk/sr2010_completereport.pdf
36. Equality and Human Rights Commission (2012) Making Fair Financial Decisions Final Report. EHRC: London http://www.
equalityhumanrights.com/legal-and-policy/inquiries-and-assessments/section-31-assessment-of-hm-treasury/the-assessment-finalreport/
37. HM Treasury and Department for Business Innovation and Skills (2011) Plan for Growth http://cdn.hm-treasury.gov.uk/2011budget_growth.
pdf
38. Equality and Human Rights Commission (2012) Making Fair Financial Decisions Final Report. EHRC: London http://www.
equalityhumanrights.com/legal-and-policy/inquiries-and-assessments/section-31-assessment-of-hm-treasury/the-assessment-finalreport/
39. Women’s Budget Group http://www.wbg.org.uk/ Accessed: 21/03/13
34 Women’s equality in the UK: CEDAW shadow report 2013