It is hard to know what women’s role in British society actually is, since there is no one path that women are expected to follow. Women can get an education and pursue a career, if this is what they want, or they can get married and leave the workplace to stay at home to raise their children, if they can afford to do so. Some women decide that they want both a career and a family life, which obviously requires good time management skills! What is clear is that there are many options available to British women about how they live their lives.

Britain is far from being a fair and equal society. Class is still an issue, while race can impact upon people’s life chances. Gender also continues to influence the way individuals are treated, since women continue to struggle to make it to the most powerful and influential positions in society. In politics, business and finance, it tends to be men that run the show, which may have something to do with in-built prejudices concerning women’s abilities in the workplace.

Plus, even if women are not allowed to be asked in an interview whether they intend to have children, the assumption is that they will. Consequently, it would appear that employers would prefer to hire someone who is going to be completely dedicated to their job, rather than someone who will have to take maternity leave for months on end. Not all women even want children, but there is an expectation that most will, although it is hardly fair to discriminate against women for fulfilling an essential role, anyway. If women stopped having children, society would cease to function, although this is unlikely to happen any time soon.

There are some British women who make it into the top professions, though quite often the most successful women are those who have come from privileged backgrounds. A disparity exists between the opportunities given to girls from disadvantaged backgrounds and those given to girls from affluent backgrounds, something which continues to influence their lives as they become adults.

Girls from poorer backgrounds may have fewer aspirations and find themselves leaving education early in order to end up in a badly-paid, boring job and to have children. Middle-class girls are more likely to be pushed on by their parents to make something of their lives. There may be an underlying assumption that eventually they will settle down, but the emphasis is on encouraging them to get an education so that they have a greater amount of choice as adults.

Women obviously have an important role to play in British society, as do women in any society, though what role they take on is often up to the decisions taken by individual women.