ABSTRACT
Mapping change in relation to gender equality in the late twentieth century, incoming president of the National Association of Schoolmasters and Union of Women Teachers, Pat Lerew, told the annual conference:
I know we have come a long way from my grammar school days when the only career options seemed to be teaching or nursing and when, as a young married woman in the 1960s, my earnings could not be included in any mortgage application. I wasn’t allowed to enter into any hire-purchase agreements and my life was not worth insuring. I suppose there was the small advantage of not being responsible for my own debts. Since then, equality laws have ensured that these situations no longer apply and on the face of it there is gender equality. We all know that the truth is very different.
