Changing Role and Status of Women in Britain: 1919-1939

Assess the extent to which the role and status of women in Britain changed in the period 1919–39.

During the war, women had taken on many working roles traditionally associated with men, most notably in the munitions Industry and post-war hoped for further change. After the First World War, many returning servicemen reclaimed the available jobs, and the numbers of women workers, particularly in industry and trade, declined.

During the 1920s and 30s, the UK economy was plunged into a recession leading to very high levels of unemployment and it was not surprising that many women who tried to find work that made use of the skills they had gained in the industries during the First World War were vilified by the press for ‘taking up ex-servicemen’s jobs’. Although unemployment benefit had been introduced through the National Insurance Act 1911, women were not eligible for benefits if they refused to take up available jobs in domestic service. This forced women back towards what was considered ‘women’s work’ including laundry, dressmaking, domestic work, and work in ‘sweated industries’.

During this period, the government replicated women’s unequal pay rates in the labour market by setting the unemployment benefit for women at a lower rate than that for men. However, some job opportunities in new industries and professions did open up for women through the 1920s and 30s. Following the Education Act of 1918 which raised the school leaving age to 14, women were better educated. The Sex Disqualification Act of 1919 made it somewhat easier for women to go to university and take up professional jobs as teachers, nurses and a few even qualified as doctors. Middle class women benefited from these increased opportunities.

During this time, women began to get jobs in increasing numbers in the civil service accounting for about a quarter of all such posts by 1935, though these were mostly at clerical and administrative grades rather than the technical and professional jobs which were still dominated by men. Some jobs in new and existing industries came to be considered ‘women’s work’ such as assembly work in the engineering, electrical, food and drink industries, as well as clerical work, typing and counter-sales. However, these jobs were low paid and involved long working hours and shift work. Women workers were usually excluded from supervisory roles or work that was considered to be ‘skilled’, despite women’s successful roles in such jobs during the First World War.

By the 1930s, about one third of British women over the age of 15 worked outside the home, of whom nearly a third still worked in domestic service. However, only one tenth of married women worked. Predominant social expectations at that time reinforced the view that caring, and cooking was exclusively ‘women’s work’. Indeed, without electrical appliances like washing machines, domestic labour was time-consuming and hard work. The civil service, the education sector and new professions operated a ‘marriage bar’, which meant that women had to resign their posts when they got married. Even those who defied these unofficial rules found that it was impossible to continue working once they had children.

Trade unions, which were led by men, continued to be concerned that women would be employed as cheap labour in these new industries. The wartime demand for wage equality had previously been utilised to recruit women to trade unions. But during the inter-war years most unions drew back from this demand. Instead, they actively campaigned to restrict women’s employment in certain industries by calling for the stricter implementation of a ‘marriage bar’ or the introduction of such a bar in new industries. So, in the interwar years, the goal of equal pay receded. By 1931, a working woman's weekly wage had returned to the pre-war situation of half the male rate in most industries.

During this period, women gained the right to vote and this led to some early attempts to mobilise the women’s votes on issues of concern to women, including issues at work. Women over 30 gained the vote in 1918, however, the suffrage movement had been a campaign about women’s political status, not about women’s role in society. The vote did not lead to a large increase in female elected representatives – between 1918 and 1931, only 1.5% of Conservative candidates were women, while Labour did not do much better with only 3.9% of candidates being women. On top of this, those that did stand were less likely to win.

Another issue which limited the changes to women’s position in society was the conservatism of many women. One of the first female MPs, the Duchess of Atholl, had previously been an opponent of women’s suffrage, while even Emmeline Pankhurst, a prominent campaigner for women’s suffrage, stood as a candidate for the Conservative Party in 1927; a party that was experiencing division over whether to allow more women the vote. The British political landscape was to remain essentially a man’s world for some time.

By 1927, the issue of universal suffrage was a prominent topic of discussion. As with the Act in 1918, it was hotly contested, even if the motivations and argument were often different. Many people within the Establishment were very concerned about allowing millions of women, many of whom would be working-class, to vote. In 1928 the Representation of the People (Equal Franchise) Act was passed which gave women the same voting rights as men. The matter was not as simple as one Party introducing it and their majority securing them the votes; the Conservative Party in government was so divided on the issue that they relied on Liberal and Labour votes to ensure it became law.