HC Deb 06 December 1956 vol 561 cc1589-602

10.24 p.m.

Mr. William Hannan (Glasgow, Maryhill)

I beg to move: That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that the Teachers' Salaries (Scotland) Regulations, 1956 (S.I., 1956, No. 1656), dated 23rd October, 1956, a copy of which was laid before this House on 31st October, in the last Session of Parliament, be annulled. These Regulations have for their purpose the establishment of equal pay as between men and women of the teaching profession in Scotland. The Explanatory Note says that they give effect to the policy of equating in seven stages the women's scales to those for men. My hon. Friends and I want to make it clear that if that were so we should have no objection to these Regulations. In so far as they provide for equal pay between men and women graduates, and in their general purpose, we accept them. Let there be no doubt about that.

There is, however, one very important aspect which we believe is a breach of the principle of equal pay, which will continue inequality and which has already given rise to some resentment among women teachers in Scotland. It concerns that group of teachers known as non-graduate women teachers.

It putting down this Prayer, my hon. Friends and I have adopted one of the methods open to us in the House to voice our perturbation and to seek some assurance, if it is possible to obtain it from the Government, that they will reconsider the matter or will at least take this opportunity of giving the House a fuller explanation than we have yet had.

Equal pay has been granted by a series of instalments until 1961, when it will be fully implemented to all women in the teaching profession—with one exception. The one exception is the case of the women non-graduates who hold the same qualifications as men non-graduates. Men non-graduates with these same qualifications will continue to be paid on a higher scale than women non-graduates, even in 1961.

For example, men who are being paid £535 this year will in ten years' time be receiving £735 and in eighteen years' time, at their maximum, £985. Non-graduate women at present receiving £470 will be receiving £605 in ten years' time and at their maximum—be it noted, in twenty years and not eighteen—will be receiving £780.

Even in 1960 there will still be disparity. While it is true that the salaries of non-graduate women will be increasing as from this year, there will still be a difference of £135 and the maximum will be attained after eighteen years in the case of men and after twenty years in the case of women non-graduates.

Whatever may be the reasons advanced for this disparity, it surely makes one thing clear—that there is no equal pay for equal qualifications. The first question which we should like to ask is plain and straightforward: why should this be? If the principle of equal pay is being said to be carried out in these Regulations, why should there be this disparity between these two groups of people both with the same qualifications? The fact that explanations have to be made at all is a tacit admission that there is a breach in the principle.

From the figures quoted it will be seen that at no point do the salaries of men and women correspond. Whatever else it is, this is certainly not equal pay. While it is true that women's salaries will have increased by 1960 compared with their salaries in 1956, even at the maximum there will be this difference.

Replying to Questions on this topic on Tuesday, 30th October, the Secretary of State, in his very first sentence, said: The Draft Salaries Regulations propose equal pay instalments for all women. I do not know whether the Joint Under-Secretary will wish to persist in that statement. Surely, it is not true. So far as we understand the Regulations, they provide for equal pay as between graduate men and graduate women—that we can understand and approve-but there certainly is a pay difference between non-graduate men and non-graduate women, and it is to that that this Prayer is directed.

There is one test. If the salary of the non-graduate women is being equated with some group of men, will the Under-Secretary say with which group it is being equated? That will help to an understanding. So far as our information goes at the moment, we cannot understand with what group of male teachers the salaries of non-graduate women's salaries are being equated.

In his reply on 30th October, the Secretary of State went on to say, Any appearance of inequality arises because non-graduate men teachers of general subjects trained before 1926 … and so on. This is not the appearance of inequality; it is an actual inequality, and our case is that by replying in such terms the right hon. Gentleman was really evading the issue. The hon. Lady the Member for Tynemouth (Dame Irene Ward) put a supplementary question which got to the heart of the problem. She asked: Are non-graduate women paid the same as non-graduate men? The Secretary of State dodged that question, and took refuge in saying: I prefer to have notice of that question," Surely he knew then, as he knows now, that the answer is "No"? He also said: Graduation for women is not compulsory, and I can find no good reason for paying non-graduate women on the same scale as graduate men and women."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 30th October, 1956; Vol. 558, c. 1249.] That was not what he was asked. My hon. Friends and I accept the fact that non-graduates should not receive as much as the graduates, and these teachers, to do them justice, are not asking for that. They are not asking for pay equal to that of men and women graduates but for pay equal to that of male non-graduates. That is the simple fact. We therefore think that there is some reason in their case, and if the Under-Secretary can help to throw some light on the matter, I shall be very grateful indeed. Unless women non-graduates receive the same salary as non-graduate men we cannot say that we have equal pay here.

Time does not permit me to pursue this matter much further. I know that some of my hon. Friends want to deal perhaps, with some of the expected answers of the Joint Under-Secretary. We are aware of some of the reasons which may be given for the concessions made in the past to men non-graduates. These Regulations have restrictions as to the date of entry of men non-graduates in relation to their receiving graduate salaries. In the draft Regulations published prior to this—in page 36, paragraph 2—this statement appears: Where a teacher, being a man, holds the Teacher's General Certificate without a degree…or another degree approved as equivalent thereto, the basic element of his salary shall be calculated as it would have been if he had held such a degree. There is no qualification as to time or how many years he may have held it. There are no conditions laid down as to how long he should have been in the teaching profession. If that applies to men, why should women be singled out? Why should a distinction be made in the same Regulations whereby women who hold the same certificate as men get a lower salary than non-graduate men?

As I indicated at the beginning of my speech, there are these misunderstandings and a great feeling of resentment amongst women non-graduates. May I repeat that there is no objection on this side of the House to non-graduates receiving a smaller salary than graduates, and no objection to women graduates receiving the same salary as men graduates. That is understood. What we want to know is why the Government were influenced into coming to a decision that women non-graduates should be discriminated against, as a result of which they receive a smaller income than men with the same qualifications.

10.36 p.m.

Mr. George Lawson (Motherwell)

I beg to second the Motion.

In associating myself with what has been said by my hon. Friend the Member for Maryhill (Mr. Hannan), I should like to say that it may be that we do not know all the reasons why this position has arisen, but our understanding of the matter is that whereas prior to 1926 both men and women could take the Teacher's General Certificate, after 1926 the men had to be graduates, whereas the women could remain non-graduates.

In this process of making all men teachers graduates—and I am speaking of general teachers—exception was permitted for those who had trained prior to 1926, and any male teacher who had had his training before 1926 was treated as a graduate. Exception was also made for the women, inasmuch as women teachers who had had their training prior to 1st January, 1920, were also treated as graduates, but any woman teacher receiving her training subsequent to 1st January, 1920, was treated on a non-graduate basis, unless she had actually become a graduate. That is the position as we understand it.

I should like to make a plea on a narrower point than that dealt with by my hon. Friend. I associate myself with his request that there should be equal payment for those performing jobs requiring the same qualifications, but, in anticipation of the Joint Under-Secretary of State saying that the Government are not prepared to accede to that request, I should like to make a further plea. If nothing can be done for the general body of women non-graduates who are performing these tasks, I ask that the Government should rectify the anomaly of men who had their training before 1926 being treated as graduates, in contradistinction to women being treated as graduates only if they received their training prior to 1920. If there is to be a year specified, the year should be the same for both.

I know it could be argued, and probably will be argued, that up to 1920 there were some universities in Scotland which did not in fact accept women and give them degrees. There were, however, universities which did. I understand that Glasgow at least gave women degrees. But whether or not there was that situation, it seems to me to be a very fine point indeed to take to say that such a distinction should be drawn.

There was this renovation or transformation of the educational scheme in 1926, whereby it became obligatory for men to become graduates, but it should be remembered that it was not a watertight scheme. There must have been many hundreds of male teachers, non-graduates, who came in under the emergency training scheme. In fact, the scheme has not been a watertight one.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. J. Henderson Stewart)

I hesitate to interrupt the hon. Gentleman, but I do not think he is using that expression quite fairly. The men who went through the emergency scheme went through it in the knowledge that they would get the equivalent of the graduate salary. It was regarded, as the hon. Gentleman knows, as a special scheme after the war to help the boys who had been in the Services. It was a shortened period of training or of university work. They have always been regarded as graduates. There is no escape from that; that is a plain fact.

Mr. Lawson

Yes, but has it not been the case that there have been, for example, men who became teachers who were not Service men? Whether or not there was that understanding, the fact remains that these men did not acquire the qualification of the graduate. Yet they are being treated as graduates.

What I am pointing out is that there was an exception made. The exception applied to men. I am suggesting that if we are to draw a line—and I agree that in many cases we have to do so—we should be a little more fair in drawing it. The year 1926 might be taken as a turning point, as a year when there were very considerable changes made. What I am asking here is that we should at least remove part of the anomalies which exist in this scheme. Those women who had their training prior to 1926 are comparable in their abilities as teachers, and fulfil their jobs as well as the men. I should say. To my mind, those teachers should certainly, at this stage, be treated on the same basis as the men. If we are not to bring them all in, I suggest that we at least bring in the date for the women up to 1926.

10.44 p.m.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. J. Henderson Stewart)

I am much obliged to the hon. Member for Maryhill (Mr. Hannan) and to the hon. Member for Motherwell (Mr. Lawson) for having given the House an opportunity of dealing with this matter.

I think it would be right to say that the only group of non-graduate women with any case at all for saying that they are not being treated in the same way as the equivalent male teacher would be those to whom the hon. Member for Motherwell has just referred. I agree that, on the face of it, it looks as if in that group there is an anomaly. I am very glad to have the opportunity of dealing with it, because I have had, as I know hon. Members on both sides of the House have had, a good many letters on the subject. I have attempted to reply to all of them, but it is not easy to put these matters in a short communication.

I wonder whether the House would mind if I set the background so that we may see what it is we are talking about. The last two-and-a-half years have been a period of exceptional activity in the realm of teachers' salaries, as the hon. Members know. We had the salary Regulations of 1954, and no sooner were they brought into operation than the National Joint Council proceeded to determine a new structure for further education salaries. That new structure was introduced in April, 1955. Hon. Members on both sides of the House, I am glad to say, know that it has been well received.

Then the equal pay issue arose, to which the hon. Member for Maryhill has referred, and a second amendment of the salary Regulations was made in August, 1955, making provision for equal pay to be implemented over a period of seven years. The first of these increases came into effect in September last year and, as has been said tonight already, it will be fully achieved in 1961.

Then, the Appleton Committee put forward its recommendations. It recommended higher salaries for teachers of mathematics and science for honours as well as ordinary graduates. The Appleton Committee's recommendation was part of an effort to get more well-qualified teachers of mathematics and science. The National Joint Council looked at those proposals, and the Council in turn proposed increases in the salaries of all graduates, whether in mathematics, English, history or anything else. They were incorporated in amendment No. 3, which came into operation in April this year.

Lastly, acting on a suggestion made on behalf of my right hon. Friend, the National Joint Council recommended an interim increase, and a fourth set of amending Regulations was issued authorising a 7 per cent. increase in all basic salaries as from April this year.

These were all piecemeal measures and dealt with particular issues. Except for the 7 per cent. increase, they applied only to particular groups of teachers. It was almost inevitable that those measures should have left some anomalies in their train. Therefore, throughout the spring and early summer of this year, the National Council conducted a fundamental examination of teachers' salaries in order to obtain a fair and equitable scale—one group of teachers as against another. What the Council wanted to achieve was that salaries would be not only appropriate to the profession as a whole and in reasonable line with those in outside professions, but would ensure that the relativities between one group of teachers and another would be right, and that any possible anomalies, wherever they existed, should be rectified.

The salary Regulations under debate tonight are the result of that examination made this year by the National Joint Council. As the House knows, they are in conformity with the decisions of the National Joint Council. In my view, these Regulations represent a really praiseworthy attempt to put the whole matter on a sound basis. It is natural that when a thoroughgoing review of this kind takes place, groups of teachers should examine their position in relation to that of others to see how they stand. It is as a result of that examination, I fancy, that the hon. Members have raised this matter tonight, because one group of those teachers has been active in stating its case.

What is the main criticism of the Regulations in regard to this matter of the non-graduate women?

It refers, as the hon. Member for Motherwell has said, to salaries of non-graduate women, particularly those qualified after 1921 but before 1927, or, as I think the hon. Member put it, to those trained between 1920 and 1926, which is the same thing. Why are these women picked out? What is their trouble? There is a great deal of history to this. Before 1922, that is 34 years ago, it was impossible, because of the ban on women in most Scottish universities, for any but a few women to become graduates. Dundee and St. Andrew's, for example, had no graduation whatever, and, therefore, women from around Fife and Dundee could not become graduates.

This imposed a severe handicap upon women, especially those who wanted to enter the teaching profession, and it created an injustice that called for rectification. This was done. It was rectified in 1945, when it was decided that this group—and they numbered over 3,000—who had trained as teachers before 1922 should be granted graduate salaries, on account of the peculiar difficulties from which they suffered at that time. Therefore, 1922 was a very important watershed for women teachers. After that date they enjoyed the option of becoming graduates or not before entering into training as teachers. So much for the women.

The watershed for men teachers was in 1926, four years later. That was their big year, when it was laid down that the granting of the General Certificate was dependent upon their first becoming graduates. I will return to these men in a moment. The claim made tonight by the hon. Member for Motherwell, I understand, is that non-graduate women who qualified after 1921 but before 1927 should be paid graduate scales, because men trained in the same period are paid graduate scales. I should like to examine that proposition.

To understand the matter properly we have to take into account two fundamental considerations. The first is that the principle of equal pay has been agreed and must be adhered to. I think that we all agree on that. The second is that the graduate scale must be better than the non-graduate scale. Bearing in mind the need for graduate teachers, the incentive of the higher graduate scale, as a reward for the longer courses they take, is necessary if we are to have these graduates. To bring about this adjustment between graduate as opposed to non-graduate, two scales for men have been made. Scale III is for graduates and Scale VI is for non-graduate men. These non-graduate men are for the most part teachers with music, handwork and other qualifications of that kind.

It was recommended by the committee set up this year to evaluate the qualifications of technical teachers relative to others that these teachers of music and other technical subjects should be regarded as equivalent to primary teachers who have taken a three-year non-graduate course. That was not my decision. That was the decision of very highly competent persons who were appointed to examine this matter.

Scale VI is the scale for non-graduate primary teachers. When equal pay is fully implemented this will be the scale for both men and women non-graduate teachers. I hope I make that plain to the hon. Member for Maryhill. It is, therefore, not anomalous or wrong that the non-graduate women should be paid with reference to this scale, as, in fact, they are paid. If there is an anomaly at all it is that the group of men, the non-graduate men who got the General Certificate before 1926, are on a higher scale. If there is an anomaly it arises not because the women are underprivileged, but because this group of men enjoy certain special privileges.

The position of the men enjoying that special privilege arises in this way: before 1926, a man who wished to become a primary teacher, with the General Certificate, could be either a graduate or a non-graduate. After 1926, the man had to be a graduate, a condition, however, which was not imposed upon women, who were still left with the choice. When the national standard scales were first instituted in 1945, for the whole of Scotland, the National Joint Council recommended that the non-graduate men trained before 1926 should not be penalised because they had not chosen to be graduates and should in fact be paid on a graduate scale.

The Secretary of State at that time—I think it was the late Mr. Westwood—accepted that recommendation, I think rightly. The position of privilege, therefore, if that is what hon. Members call it, has been established for a long number of years. The Government of which the hon. Lady the Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison) was so distinguished a member, had, in 1951, an opportunity to change the position when the differentials between women graduates and non-graduates were reintroduced, which I thought was a very sensible thing to do. The hon. Lady and her hon. and right hon. Friends did not take the opportunity then to introduce similar differentials for the pre-1926 men. I think she was right not to do that. I still think so. That is why I do not think it right for me to propose it tonight.

I do not think that any hon. Member would say that the concession granted to this group of men should be withdrawn at this late date. I do not think that would be right at all, but I emphasise again that it is these men who are in a position of privilege and not the corresponding women who are under-privileged. The fact is that 1926 was a year of particular importance in the history of teacher training for men, but it has no such significance for women because before and after that date women have had the choice open to them to be either graduates or non-graduates.

I find it difficult to agree with the hon. Member that we should do something to overturn this old arrangement. In my view, the question which has been raised about the salary of these women is not an issue which arises in regard to equal pay. If it were acceded to it would mean that a privilege which had been given to certain men for one reason would now be accorded to women for a totally different reason.

This matter has been discussed at length with the National Joint Council. Both employers and teachers concurred, and now concur, in the view that the differentiation for graduation should be maintained and that a privilege given to a particular group for a particular reason should not be extended to another group to whom the reason does not apply. I have not heard of any solution of this problem which is just and reasonable other than the solution provided in the Regulations. If hon. Members are critical, they should be constructively critical and suggest a just and reasonable solution which would be in keeping with the two cardinal considerations which I stated at the beginning.

We have three choices. We can maintain the position of the Regulations as they are now put to us, with the unanimous recommendation of the Council, confirmed by the Council as they are now, in an interview with the Council and my right hon. Friend the Minister of State. Or we can upgrade the non-graduate women; but if we did that we should destroy the differentiation which in my own and in everybody else's opinion is necessary. Or we can reduce this particular group of men who are in a position of privilege; I do not think that that is defensible at all.

May I pick up a point raised by the hon. Gentleman about the emergency scheme? It has really nothing to do with this, but I am glad to be able to attempt—to put it modestly—to clarify this matter. The emergency scheme was introduced in 1944, at the end of the war, when the normal training period for men who had served in the war was two and two-third years. That was fixed at the time to be the equivalent of the graduating course prevailing in the immediate post-war years, namely, two years for a degree and two terms of teacher training.

This emergency course was devised and recognised throughout as a graduate equivalent course; that was its intention. It was thought to be the only fair thing we could do for men who had served. The women's emergency course, on the other hand, only lasted for two years, and was devised as equivalent to the normal non-graduating course. The claim of the men for the graduate scale is quite clear, and any attempt to degrade them would be unfair.

I will gladly answer any questions that hon. Members may wish to put to me. I will now sum up what the Regulations do. It would be a pity if the House, having passed these Regulations. did not recognise just how much it is doing for the profession. Under these Regulations, the maximum basic salary for an honours graduate man is now £1,200 a year, as against £960 in 1954, a rise of no less than 25 per cent. That is a considerable rise. The maximum basic salary of the ordinary graduate man, serving in a primary school, has gone up from £810 in 1954 to £985 under these Regulations, an increase of 22 per cent. The maximum basic salary for non-graduate women trained for three years has gone up from £627 in 1954 to £780 a rise of 24 per cent. When equal pay is implemented, in five years' time, the salary of these non-graduate women will be £900, representing a 43 per cent. increase over the 1954 level.

As to the minimum starting salaries, about which there has been no complaint tonight, but on which I have seen a letter or two in the newspapers—there was one this morning—I do not think that that has been anywhere regarded by responsible people as a just cause for complaint. The Appleton Committee went into this matter with great care and concluded that the starting end of the salary scale was not so important as the other end, the maximum to which it could rise. The whole idea of the recommendation was to lift the ceiling and that, in fact, is what it did.

In addition to all that, these Regulations upgrade many technical teachers and the responsibility elements of salaries have also been increased between 20 per cent. and 25 per cent. I hope that we can agree that the new scales have given teachers a good and not ungenerous settlement. I believe the salaries in the profession are now such as to make the profession able to compete on a broad front with other professions and occupations.

The scales are devised by the National Joint Council, agreed to by both sides, and endeavour not only to give justice to the profession as a whole, but also—after very careful consideration of the relativities—to do justice as between one group of teachers and another. We should all think very hard and assure ourselves that we are right before we attempt to destroy or upset a salary structure which has been negotiated with such care and which has been devised to be just and fair to all sections of the profession. I feel that tonight I am defending new salary Regulations which really represent a very great advance, upon which I think the House can feel a certain measure of satisfaction, if not a little pride, by doing some measure of justice to a very fine profession.

11.8 p.m.

Mr. Hannan

May I say that with the general contention of the Joint Under-Secretary about the importance of these Regulations we have no quarrel; indeed, I think that my hon. Friend the Member for Motherwell (Mr. Lawson) and I indicated that at the beginning of the discussion.

The Prayer was moved for the purpose of getting more information on a single point of criticism which had been directed at the Regulations, namely, on the failure, as it seemed, to give equal pay for equal qualifications of men and women. The Under-Secretary has afforded us a full explanation of the background and the reasons for coming to this decision. What has appealed to me is the fact that the National Joint Council has had this matter under consideration and to hear that it concurred in a unanimous decision impressed me. May I support the suggestion of my hon. Friend the Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison), that such questions should be taken out of politics altogether.

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Motion.

Motion, by leave, withdrawn.