Jump to content
talkfootball365
  • Welcome to talkfootball365!

    The better place to talk football.

So Women Really are the Weaker Sex..


football forum

Recommended Posts

In a recent ruling the Police Force is being told to review it's Police Dog Handler training courses because a Woman Officer found it 'too hard' to complete. In addition to that she was awarded 15K as a result of indirect discrimination... Well, I have a bit of an issue with that.. 

It's probably not much of a surprise to find that the Police Dog handling units have a greater percentage of Male Handlers compared to Female ones but they do have Female Handlers that have successfully passed this test in the past. The Gloucester Force has 4 out of 48 Handlers. Avon & Somerset had 3 out of 24 and Whiltshire had 4 out of 12. Obviously Whitlshire women are made of sterner stuff and not the sort you want to get suckered into any arm wrestling competitions with.. 

Here is the article... 

 A female police officer has been awarded £15,000 after failing a grueling fitness test to become a dog handler - and now the rules are changing. Constable Kim-Louise Carter was up against a ten-mile run before she had to carry a dog over a course known as 'The Long Walk', in wet and muddy conditions. She claimed that the test put women at a disadvantage because it was too physically tough to pass as she struggled to keep up with her male equivalents.

Miss Carter, 31 won a landmark sex-discrimination case proving that the system to become a dog handler was too demanding for some women.

Gloucester, Avon and Somerset and Wiltshire police forces all used the test that Miss Carter tackled. As a result each constabularly has a higher percentage of male dog handlers compared to female, the employment tribunal in Bristol heard.  

During the hearing Judge Street ordered that the three police forces must review their exam course. But this may affect other constabularies where women officers have struggled to complete the taxing fitness challenge. Miss Carter told the tribunal that she became exhausted while carrying a dog that weighed 35kg, appropriately named Hulk, up a hill. She also said that she 'dug deep, real deep' to keep up with the men who were moving at a faster pace than her. She added: 'I could lift the dog but had nothing left to carry him. I just couldn't get any momentum', 

Miss Carter's goal to become a dog hander within the Gloucestershire constabularly, where she is still a serving officer, ended when she was withdrawn from the two-and-a-half-hour exam. The female police constable, who began her policing career as a community support officer in 2005 before becoming a constable in 2013, said the test favoured men more than women. The tribunal heard that out of 48 dog handles in the Gloucester force just four were women. While Avon and Somerset had three women out of 24 handlers and Whiltshire had four women out of 12 in total.

However the defence for the forces said that in order to succeed as a dog handler it is vital to be phyiscally fit as tracking criminals over long periods of time in debilitating conditions and then arresting the criminal was especially challenging.

There is a higher pass rate of men because they have different levels of strength and stamina than women and that the 'qualifying situation' need to be reviewed. These findings were published last week following the tribunal which took place over four days between October and November last year. 

Judge Street said: 'Where a standard test had negative impacts on members of a protected group, here women, then it either needs to be changed or objectively justified.'

The judge agreed women were at particular disadvantage compared with men and awarded Miss Carter a total of £14,930 for indirect sex discrimination.

A spokesman for Gloucestershire police said the three forces were now reviewing the judges' recommendations. 

 

So firstly the most obvious problem I have with this is that you are no longer testing on a level playing field? As has been pointed out the test requires you to be in peak physical condition because of the nature of what Dog handlers do and it could be argued that she was just not fit enough to pass this test. It's not a lot I know but other Women Officers ( which we are no longer allowed to call them ) have passed this test and are currently working in that field so why should they be required to make this change?? I doubt this will have done a lot for those Women that had to undergo and pass this test previously. I don't think anyone Male or Female would be happy about someone that got in as a result of an easy ride while they had to knock themselves out to achieve the same thing, I certainly know I wouldn't be... 

Secondly I am dead against this compensation shit for just about everything these days.. She failed and now we the taxpaying mugs are throwing more money in the direction of people who don't deserve it. Failing is a part of life. It's what builds character and helps you focus on areas of weakness.. I am now thinking of putting in a claim that I was unable to be a Brain Surgeon because the exam was far too hard for me to pass... The fact I don't have the skills required to do that job is neither here nor there just cough up the compo cash please and I will be on my way satisfied that I have struck a blow for every council bin man up and down the country.... 

Thirdly, and what probably concerns me most is that the levels of fitness required to do certain jobs will now come under scrutiny.. In certain jobs there are expected levels of fitness needed to be good at what you do, The Forces for example, Firefighters being another and the Police Force in general is no exception.. It's no wonder with all this going on that we don't see any old plod on the street any more as they are probably too unfit to walk any reasonable distance before they need to hit the cafe and have a break ( and trust me I have actually seen this going on ) It just weakens the whole level of effort and fitness required which can't be a good thing given the types of work they encounter on a daily basis..  

Things like this just shout 'damsel in distress' So while the Men are doing the 2 mile hike uphill with dog on back the Women will now get to eat Ice cream and a watch a weepy then discuss their feelings afterwards to have got through... Can't be doing the Girl Power movement much good can it? Equal Rights my Arse!! 

Just to finish on something a little more sensible I appreciate that the job is a tough one. They could possibly look at giving Female Officers a lighter dog rather than the heaviest one available so that kind of adjustment would be reasonable in my eyes. Once you become a Dog handler your Dog becomes your partner on the streets until the dog retires from service but changing the whole test and having someone out there not fully fit enough to do the job is a concern. Also do not agree that because you fail you should be compensated under such circumstances... It's just rewarding mediocrity 

Women.. :ph34r:

 



 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 33
  • Created
  • Last Reply

It depends, is the courses difficulty sufficient enough for the job or is the courses difficulty greater than the difficulty of actually doing the job?

I feel like if she's won a landmark case there's got to be more to this than simply "nagging woman gets compensation because she kept moaning it was too hard"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 minutes ago, Danny said:

It depends, is the courses difficulty sufficient enough for the job or is the courses difficulty greater than the difficulty of actually doing the job?

I feel like if she's won a landmark case there's got to be more to this than simply "nagging woman gets compensation because she kept moaning it was too hard"

No-one said she was nagging did they.... What she has done is successfully challenged a standard physical test for Women in that particular role, My concern would be more about lowering the standard to accommodate someone who was not fit enough to carry out the role in the first place. If other Women had completed the task it would be fair to say she could have as well.. I know it's a male dominated environment and the odds of her passing the physical aspect of it are lower than her male counterparts but other Women have been able to do this.    

Would it be fair or reasonable for me to sue the Fire Service if I failed the physical exam of being able to carry someone down a ladder over my shoulder because I am getting on a bit?? Could I say that the test was too hard for someone my age and that it needs to take that into account? 

8 minutes ago, Stan said:

£15k is a hefty amount for failing a test where other women have succeeded...

I could understand the exam being brought under review or even being tweaked but the money aspect is all wrong for me... They changed her Dog on that stage of the exam which to me was a bit unfair. The Dog she trained with would probably have been the Dog she was on the streets with if she had passed so it would have been more realistic for her to have had a go at it with the lighter dog she had before.. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 hours ago, Bluewolf said:

No-one said she was nagging did they.... What she has done is successfully challenged a standard physical test for Women in that particular role, My concern would be more about lowering the standard to accommodate someone who was not fit enough to carry out the role in the first place. If other Women had completed the task it would be fair to say she could have as well.. I know it's a male dominated environment and the odds of her passing the physical aspect of it are lower than her male counterparts but other Women have been able to do this.    

Would it be fair or reasonable for me to sue the Fire Service if I failed the physical exam of being able to carry someone down a ladder over my shoulder because I am getting on a bit?? Could I say that the test was too hard for someone my age and that it needs to take that into account? 

What I'm saying is that the test's difficulty may not be suitable for the actual job, hence why she won a court case. Also not saying that you're saying she's nagging etc, but that will be the rhetoric used by tabloids and people reading them.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 hours ago, Bluewolf said:

Would it be fair or reasonable for me to sue the Fire Service if I failed the physical exam of being able to carry someone down a ladder over my shoulder because I am getting on a bit?? Could I say that the test was too hard for someone my age and that it needs to take that into account? 

Yes. The defence would have to provide the evidence that carrying someone down a ladder over their shoulder is an actual facet of the role and not something thought up from an episode of Fireman Sam :D

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 minutes ago, Kitchen Sales said:

Morrison's should require their shelf stackers to bicep curl 20kg, got to get those high standards 

If the standards were unecessarily high in general for the task that needs to be completed then fair enough but that isn't a case of discrimination that directly or indirectly targets women. To suggest it is means suggesting that women in general are somehow incapable of completing the course because they're women rather than it just being a case of this woman not being good enough.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

14 minutes ago, 6666 said:

If the standards were unecessarily high in general for the task that needs to be completed then fair enough but that isn't a case of discrimintaion that directly or indirectly targets women. To suggest it is means suggesting that women in general are somehow incapable of completed the course because they're women rather than it just being a case of this woman not being good enough.

Men and women are not genetically the same. Those genetics lead to Men on average being both stronger and capable of becoming stronger more and easier than women. The distribution of physical capability is different. Lets assume for now that the women who pass the current test are in the higher end of the female distribution of physical strength. That higher end overlaps with the lower and maybe in some rare cases the mid range of male distribution. If the test is set on the basis of what is considered demanding to average male genetics then the average woman has no chance whatsoever and is thus gender based discriminated against.

Unless they can prove that strength is needed then by design the test is male bias.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, Kitchen Sales said:

Men and women are not genetically the same. Those genetics lead to Men on average being both stronger and capable of becoming stronger more and easier than women. The distribution of physical capability is different. Lets assume for now that the women who pass the current test are in the higher end of the female distribution of physical strength. That higher end overlaps with the lower and maybe in some rare cases the mid range of male distribution. If the test is set on the basis of what is considered demanding to average male genetics then the average woman has no chance whatsoever and is thus gender based discriminated against.

Yeah I think that's the key question: is the test designed to weed out people who are physically incapable of doing the job, or is it merely meant to weed out people below a certain arbitrary level of strength, likely set relative to the male average? 

For people confused about calling it discrimination when it's not intended as such, anti-discrimination law isn't necessarily about what is meant, it's also based on effect.

For example, if you're a supermarket and your part-time assistants are mostly women and your full-time assistants are mostly men, and you keep wages for part-timers lower than full-timers, that has the effect of discrimination, and unless you can point to a good reason as to why your pay structure is like that, then it's treated like discrimination. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, Kitchen Sales said:

Men and women are not genetically the same. Those genetics lead to Men on average being both stronger and capable of becoming stronger more and easier than women. The distribution of physical capability is different. Lets assume for now that the women who pass the current test are in the higher end of the female distribution of physical strength. That higher end overlaps with the lower and maybe in some rare cases the mid range of male distribution. If the test is set on the basis of what is considered demanding to average male genetics then the average woman has no chance whatsoever and is thus gender based discriminated against.

Not being naturally strong doesn't stop someone from working on their strength. Now you could argue that women having to work on their strength moreso than men because they're genetically weaker is sexist but Mother Nature being a sexist man in drag is just something we all have to deal with.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

31 minutes ago, 6666 said:

Not being naturally strong doesn't stop someone from working on their strength. Now you could argue that women having to work on their strength moreso than men because they're genetically weaker is sexist but Mother Nature being a sexist man in drag is just something we all have to deal with.

Yeah of course the odds of a woman being unable to do a highly physical job are naturally going to be greater, but the situation shouldn't be exacerbated by putting physical requirements on the job that don't actually bear any practical use.

The decision isn't making it a condition that physical requirements be taken out of the job, only that those physical requirements in the test be shown to be necessary for the work. 

Edit I actually found the judgment if anyone's interested, it's only 2 pages: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a4f62eae5274a6bed6131dd/1400638_2017.Final.pdf

"We recommend using the National College Job-Related Fitness Test for cardiovascular fitness, specifically, and then that the respondents (the respondents being the police authority) specifically identify the standards required as necessary for physical function and stamina to perform the role of dog handler, with reasons, and produce a scoring matrix on that basis, as part of a multi-factorial assessment. If some aspect of that test is to be determinative, that is, capable of leading to failure or disqualification independently of the multi-factorial assessment, then the measures used must be justifiable on as objective a basis as possible".

Basically: the tribunal isn't demanding that women be hired in equal numbers, or that they get a different test, they're just asking that the test be made more rational so that people aren't turned away when they could in practice do the job. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, Kitchen Sales said:

If you are going to make someone have to drink protein shakes and eat brocolli to get a job then it has to necessary.

 

 

3 hours ago, Danny said:

I like Broccoli?

Pass... that's almost enough right there to put me off the thread.... All that yummy goodness gets pushed to one side on the plate until I do my usual belly pat while I lean back in the chair claiming I am too full to fit in another morsel routine.. 

4 hours ago, Inverted said:

Yeah of course the odds of a woman being unable to do a highly physical job are naturally going to be greater, but the situation shouldn't be exacerbated by putting physical requirements on the job that don't actually bear any practical use.

The decision isn't making it a condition that physical requirements be taken out of the job, only that those physical requirements in the test be shown to be necessary for the work. 

Edit I actually found the judgment if anyone's interested, it's only 2 pages: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a4f62eae5274a6bed6131dd/1400638_2017.Final.pdf

"We recommend using the National College Job-Related Fitness Test for cardiovascular fitness, specifically, and then that the respondents (the respondents being the police authority) specifically identify the standards required as necessary for physical function and stamina to perform the role of dog handler, with reasons, and produce a scoring matrix on that basis, as part of a multi-factorial assessment. If some aspect of that test is to be determinative, that is, capable of leading to failure or disqualification independently of the multi-factorial assessment, then the measures used must be justifiable on as objective a basis as possible".

Basically: the tribunal isn't demanding that women be hired in equal numbers, or that they get a different test, they're just asking that the test be made more rational so that people aren't turned away when they could in practice do the job. 

I don't think the case was ever about getting more Women in that particular job but as you point out more about giving people a fair crack of the Whip and I totally agree about the physical aspect being a necessary part of the job. I doubt very much that even a super fit criminal is going to still be running after a mile with a dog up their arses let alone 10 and then climb up a muddy hill to finally shake them off are they?? In that regard the test is probably unrealistic for the actual conditions you are likely to encounter.. How often would it be likely that any officer would be required to carry their dog while on duty for example?? probably not often if at all I would have thought so is that really a necessary part of the test?  

Shame we don't have the fail percentage for both sexes for this particular test overall. I should imagine that as there are higher percentage of men on the force then there is a good chance that a lot of them didn't make the grade either... I still don't agree with the sums being handed out though for compensation. There is a strong chance that she will be able to re-sit or re-take this under different conditions in 6 months to a years time and get through if the recommendations are taken on board and acted upon. 

Just as a curiosity what if she were to fail under new conditions further down the road? Could she then go back again and say it's still too hard can we drop it down again until I get through??  :ph34r:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    No registered users viewing this page.


Sign up or subscribe to remove this ad.


×
×
  • Create New...