“THE clock is being turned back” in the fight for gender equality, Labour’s Yvette Cooper warned yesterday.

Speaking at Unison’s women’s conference in Southport, the shadow home secretary blasted the Con-Dem government for hitting women “four times harder” than men despite women already earning and owning less.

“Families across the country are facing a cost of living crisis and women are being hardest hit of all,” she said.

“Month after month, things have got harder not easier. Month after month, prices have gone up faster than wages.

“According to Which? a third of women surveyed say they run out of money before the end of the month.

“We warned David Cameron from the start he was hitting women in their pockets. It’s time for women hit him back — at the ballot box.”

And today Unison general secretary Dave Prentis will deride the row over Labour’s “Barbie bus” as a distraction from the coalition’s failure to deliver for women.
When Labour deputy leader Harriet Harman launched the party’s “magenta” Women to Women campaign bus this week, shoppers at its first stop — an Asda supermarket — dismissed the stunt as “patronising.”

But Mr Prentis will say: “Aside from the debate around magenta, cerise and Barbie pink lies a much more serious issue. Last time around in 2010, more than nine million women didn’t turn out to vote.”

Making an impassioned plea for women to register to vote, he will continue: “Cuts in tax credits are costing women four times as much as men. The child benefit freeze, five times as much and cuts in childcare support, seven times as much.”

Mr Prentis will slam the widening pay gap as a “disgrace” after 40 years of progress and call out the shocking 91 per cent drop in gender discrimination cases since the introduction of employment tribunal fees.

“Let’s not forget that unions are the voice of working people. They stand up to the powerful and challenge discrimination, and negotiate for fairness in workplaces across the country,” he will say.