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From International Socialism, No.68, April 1974, p.30.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for ETOL.
Women’s Rights: A Practical Guide
Anna Coote and Tess Gill
Penguin Special, 60p.
HERE IS A straightforward and thorough account of what women are entitled to in the present system. It’s all here: equal pay, widow’s benefits, rape, marriage, leaving home before 18, prisoners’ wives, buying on HP and so on. Though the book is detailed, it is a sight more readable than the various terms you have to cope with if you ever want to claim your rights. The readability is enhanced by a variety of cartoons which themselves make a pointed comment on the differential treatment of women.
The authors do not attempt to analyse the present situation of women and limit their comments to comparisons between the rights of men and of women in the same situations. One of the authors has previously helped to write a handbook about civil liberties and this book is essentially in the same vein. It won’t tell you how to change what is wrong in the present set-up, nor does it set out to. And you might think that a detailed explanation of your rights to supplementary benefit is itself optimistic at a time when the Tories are baying for cuts in allowances to strikers’ dependants. Nevertheless, it’s a competent and useful summary, well worth paying 60p for.
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Last updated on 6.3.2008