Working mums: the construction of women workers in the banking industry

Drawing on the Australian banking industry as a case study, the paper argues that the provision of maternity leave and award protection for women returning from such leave has been used to construct women workers as transient "working mums". The motherhood appellation underscores a deep ambivalence to women in the industry, both masking and justifying entrenched and gendered occupational segregation and a rising pay equity gap. In some instances equality of opportunity has been recast as "strictly identical" treatment, despite women's difference. This occurs in an environment where legal prohibitions against discrimination are reduced to check lists in corporate risk management strategies in which minimising harm to the organisation is the centre of activity and concern.