THE majority of jobs shed by South Tyneside Council in the past two years have been female workers, new statistics suggest.
Since 2010/11, the number of local authority employees in the borough has fallen by 1,557.
But a breakdown of those figures reveal that 1,038 of that number were women – accounting for 66.6 per cent.
Regionally, the drop in the number of women employed in local government and schools accounts for the 68.7 per cent decrease in numbers employed by 12 councils in the region since the general election, the GMB union report reveals.
At Northumberland Council, the drop in the number of women employed made up 85.9 per cent of jobs shed – the highest in the region.
Tom Brennan, the Jarrow-based GMB regional secretary, said: “The drop in the number of women employed in local government is a direct result of Government cuts in public spending. This was entirely predictable as the public sector employs more women than men.
“The drop in the number of women employed in the public sector means a serious loss of income from employment to women in the North East.
“Many households depend on having income from two wage earners to pay the mortgage and the household bills.
“The impact will be even worse in the quarter of households with children that are headed by lone parents, 90 per cent of whom are women.
“In the middle of the worst recession for 80 years, it is the Government itself that is creating unemployment with 381,000 public sector posts already gone and still more cuts to come.
“These lost jobs could have been available to the 2.7m workers now facing the despair of mass unemployment.”
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