Pay dispute

THERE are exceptions to the rule. JK Rowling, for instance. The author of Harry Potter leaped from near penury to earning £20.5 million last year, as if by magic.

Posh Spice's basic salary is £2.15 million, according to the Sunday Times pay list, which means she can go Dutch with hubby David Beckham on their nights out.

And Karen Brady has proved that women can make it to the top in even the most male-orientated workplaces. She is managing director of Birmingham City FC.

Yet most women are losing out. According to the Equal Opportunities Commission, which has just celebrated its 25th anniversary, there is still an 18 per cent pay gap between the sexes.

Women receive 74 per cent of men's average weekly earnings.

Why the inequality, and what can women do themselves to close the gap? The place to answer these questions was the Evening Press Training & Job Fair held at the Merchant Adventurers' Hall in York yesterday.

"Traditionally, it has been the jobs that women do that are poorly paid, as opposed to women being poorly paid," said Claire Quinn, careers consultant at York Careers Centre.

But that is changing, and more opportunities for higher paid work exist.

"The more highly qualified women are, the more likely they are to find their pay has parity with men's.

"Traditionally male areas tend to be more highly paid. If you were to go for things like engineering and construction, these industries are likely to be more highly paid than beauty therapy or hairdressing."

The continuing pay gap prompted former Labour Employment Secretary Baroness Castle to urge women to have "more fire in their bellies". She partly blamed women's low self-esteem for the gulf.

Claire said women needed to be as career-focused as men.

"A lot of it is to do with the sort of attitude women adopt. They have to be as focused as men.Women find it more difficult to delegate. They have to delegate and be more prepared not to be liked, all these kind of things." Suzanne Lister, of Knowledge Base, the Science Park-based company which promotes community-based learning, said women were always at a disadvantage in the jobs market.

"Women will always have ultimate responsibility for the home and the family. For every sprinkling of new men, there are hundreds of thousands who aren't."

But she believes women can use different qualities to men to get on. A more caring attitude can often get the most out of staff and lead to promotion.

And it is important to update your skills throughout your career.

"Find out what you are good at, and accentuate that. It's a sensible thing for everybody to do."

Maggie Gibson, managing director of the Liz Dargue Staffing recruitment agency in Davygate, York, was very positive about women's career prospects. "We work with Nestl, Railtrack, York Health Authority, City of York Council and GNER and we have never come across discrimination. The salary's measured by the job, not the person. In all my years of experience, nobody's ever said to me 'if it was a man going for this job, how much would he get?'"