Originally Posted by MargaretR (Post 705786)

The Civil Service used to have a policy whereby a woman had to cease work on marriage.
I don't know when this practice ended, but when I started work in 1959, there was an option still availabe to women - ie the option to take a Marriage Gratuity and resign, or stay at work as a married woman.
This option was eventually withdrawn in 1977

Originally Posted by Caz (Post 705794)

So how would this "marriage gratuity" affect women in the long term? EG pensions.

If they chose to work after marriage, were there any downsides?

Originally Posted by Caz (Post 705799)

So basically what you are saying Margaret, is that any pension rights earned before marriage were disregarded?. They had to start again?

Originally Posted by Caz (Post 705782)

I'm doing a course on Equality and Diversity, and I have just come accross this during the process.


"Many of the ways that people are not treated equally in everyday life are due to power structures, stereotypes and prejudices that existed when the UK was a very unequal society. These are changing so the way people treat each other also needs to change.

In the past there were many jobs that women were not allowed to do and men and women were treated differently, for example a female teacher was not allowed to get married and keep her job, but a male teacher was. Female teachers therefore had to choose between being married and teaching and were stereotyped as unfeminine because they weren't married and didn't have children.

The unequal treatment of female teachers (not allowed to get married) affected their behaviour (did not get married) which reinforced the stereotype of them (unfeminine, not suitable for marriage). As teaching at one time was one of the few jobs that females could do, people associated educated/working women with being less feminine. This stereotype lasted for a long time."

The bit I have highlighted is the one that puzzles me. One wonders how far back in time they are going, because I can remember in the fifties a teacher at my infant school marrying and keeping her job. (Hannah St Infants...Miss Anson became Mrs Miller)

Would be interested in hearing from people older than myself (55) if they have any knowledge of this being the case.

Originally Posted by Wynonie Harris (Post 705801)

Only three years older than you, Caz, but Mrs Brown, my first ever teacher at St Peters in 1956 was, as her title implies, married. As for the civil service, my mum worked in the tax office (in what is now Platts Club), from the late 50's/early 60's, so the policy must have ended earlier.

As you say, seems stone age now. :rolleyes:

Originally Posted by MargaretR (Post 705800)

Yes - it was like being able to cash in any pension earned to the date of marriage and it was calculated on the length of time worked before marriage

Originally Posted by Caz (Post 705806)

So if you carried on working, pension continued as normal?

Originally Posted by MargaretR (Post 705809)

You had to start a pension again from scratch
Pensions are calculated on the number of years worked
To get the maximum amount possible, you had to have 40yrs that counted.