We've moved to a new site!

Join us at publicservices.international - for all the latest news, resources and struggles from around the world.

We are no longer updating world-psi.org and it will be progressively phased out: all content will be migrated to the new site and old links will redirect eventually.

Gender equality

“Women hold up half the sky – get used to it.” That message, painted on a sign at a demonstration, tells only half the story. In many ways, women do more than their share: caring for the next generation and elderly parents, household duties, and contributing economically. Women are more than equal in the responsibilities they assume. This must be matched with political, economic and social equality.

7 October - For the World Day of Decent Work, PSI launches campaign for women’s economic empowerment

05 October 2016

Around 70 women representing 22 countries from PSI's Asia Pacific region will launch, during APRECON in Japan, what is being called the "Fukuoka Statement". With the slogan “Unions at the core of women’s economic empowerment in the changing world of work”, the document will serve as a roadmap towards the UNCSW61.

No Gender Justice without Tax Justice

07 September 2016

PSI organised a two-day workshop with the participation of leading trade union and NGO gender and tax experts at the UNISON offices, in London, 30 June-1 July 2016. The activity aimed at strengthening the international debate about tax and highlighting the gender perspective.

South Korea: Survey finds hospitals are still a blind spot for maternity protection

05 September 2016
KHMU photo

PSI affiliate, KHMU carried out a survey in Spring 2016 of the working of conditions of healthcare workers and found that the shortage of nurses leads to a pregnancy rotation system (8.4%) and miscarriages or stillbirths (2.9%).

Health Services Workers' Union of Ghana commemorates its 50th anniversary

17 July 2016
Photo: Rita Arthur

Under the theme ''50 years of organizing: consolidating the gains for greater prospects", HSWU held on the same ocasion its 11th quadrennial delegates conference in Kumasi, on 28-30 June, at the Great Hall of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST).

Canada: MP committee falls short on pay equity plan

06 July 2016
Mind the Gender Pay Gap - Photo: Mike Licht - Creative Commons - http://www.flickr.com/photos/notionscapital/5297085447
Photo: Mike Licht - Creative Commons

PSI affiliate, the Canadian Union of Public Employees, Canada’s largest union, is calling on Parliament to adopt a federal pay equity law that will close the persistent gap in how women and men are paid for work of equal value.

CUPE says the time frame recommended by an MPs’ committee on pay equity doesn’t move quickly enough in addressing discrimination against women workers.

Available in Spanish and English PSI Brazil's guide on violence against women in the workplace

01 June 2016

The publication presents the problem and calls unions to combat and prevent violence. It should be used as an information, capacity building, and mobilization tool for women and men in the fight against sexist violence in the workplace.

NLC joins global action to commemorate two years of the abduction of the Chibok girls

18 April 2016
Bring Back Our Girls

The Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC), the umbrella organisation for trade unions in Nigeria, joined hands from 8-14 April 2016 during the global week of action to demand for the safe return of the abducted Chibok school girls. Public Services International’s eight Nigerian unions are affiliated to the NLC.

Caribbean SUBWOC: Raising the bar

29 March 2016

Women trade union leaders and activists from the Caribbean met in Guyana to review their work over the past year and develop plans for 2016/17. Committee members celebrated their various achievements over the year, while recognising that there is much more work to do.

Arab women & the right to peace

18 March 2016
Arab women

On 18 March, during the 60th session of the Commission on the Status of Women, PSI & WILF/MADRE/AEDIDH/ITUC will organise a trade union parallel event on: Arab Women and the human rights to peace. It will provide an opportunity for trade union and social movement leaders from Arab countries to give their views on peace as a human right.

“Trade Union 50:50 by 2024: Step it up for Gender Equality”, say PSI affiliates in Ghana

18 March 2016
IWD 2016 in Ghana

To commemorate this year’s International Women’s Day, the Trades Union Congress Ghana (TUC) organized a forum which all the 7 PSI affiliates in the country took part. Women were advised to struggle towards the 50:50 representation and participation.

PSI affiliate in Iraq calls the attention to tribal traditions that hinder the progress of women

15 March 2016
8th of March

During the celebration of the International Women's Day, the Union of Engineering and Technical Professions South Electricity Sector (UETPSES) distributed pamphlets calling the society to put a limit to such traditions when it comes to this issue.

PSI-Japan Council lobbies to promote women’s empowerment

15 March 2016

Ten people (seven women and three men) representing the All-Japan Prefectural and Municipal Workers Union, the Japan Public Sector Union and All Japan Water Supply Workers Union participated in the lobbying activity. The move was part of the Women’s Committee’s activities relating to the 8th of March.

UNCSW60: Commission on the Status of Women

13 March 2016
Photo: CTF - FCE/Flickr

The sixtieth session of the Commission on the Status of Women will take place at the United Nations Headquarters in New York from 14 to 24 March 2016.

"The commercial exploitation of public services accentuates the exclusion and marginalisation of women"

10 March 2016
Verónica Montúfar/Photo: Leo Hyde

This is the conclusion reached by Verónica Montúfar, PSI World Gender and Equity Coordinator. "Where there are no health services, women act as nurses. Where there are no schools, women provide an education for their children. In the absence of public services, women provide them."

PSI condemns the assassination of indigenous leader Berta Cáceres in Honduras

07 March 2016
Indigenous leader Berta Cáceres

Public Services International (PSI) joins other organisations in the task of collecting signatures for petitions to use at demonstrations in front of Honduran consulates and embassies and at the Session of the UN Human Rights Council scheduled for next week in Geneva.