More than a third of UK women have faced discrimination amid COVID-related job loss

The data found that 42% of people felt women had been more at a disadvantage of losing their job than men in the pandemic, while 58% believed the ongoing situation makes it harder for women to get back similar opportunities. Photo: Getty (SIphotography via Getty Images)

Some 35% of women in the UK have faced discrimination amid COVID-related job loss, promotion loss or pay cuts.

That is according to global consumer research platform Pipslay, which highlighted that gender equality in the workplace continues to lag behind gender equality in society.

The ongoing pandemic not only “threatens to slow down this global movement but may also reverse any significant progress made so far, it said. Pipslay polled a total of 6,076 people nationwide from 21 to 23 February 2021, comprising 52% women and 48% men.

The data found that 42% of people felt women had been more at a disadvantage of losing their job than men in the pandemic, while 58% believed the ongoing situation makes it harder for women to get back similar opportunities.

Almost half (45%) of Brits fear that the current health crisis will further widen the existing gender pay gap, while 70% believe companies must have work policies that enable equal parenting.

Last year the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) found that mothers are 1.5 times more likely to have quit or lost their job since the lockdown was imposed in March.

Because women are also more likely to have been furloughed, they are nine percentage points less likely to be currently working for pay than fathers, the research found.

The IFS warned that there was a risk that the differences could result in “larger detrimental effects” on the career progression and earnings of mothers than of fathers.

READ MORE: Gender pay gap hits UK's women in work ranking

It comes as unemployment numbers for Black, Asian and minority ethnic groups (BAME) have increased at more than twice the speed of the rate for white workers, a new study shows.

The Trades Union Congress (TUC) said that the soaring figures amid the COVID-19 pandemic hold up a "mirror to the structural racism" in the UK workforce.

Analysis revealed that the BAME unemployment rate rose from 5.8% to 9.5% between the final quarter in 2019 to the same time period last year.

According to the report the unemployment rate for white workers increased from 3.4% to 4.5% over the same time period.

Official data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) shows that the unemployment rate of Black people in the country (13.8%) is triple that of white people (4.5%).

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