Before the First World War women did not have equality in terms of political status, which was getting the vote.
In 1832 middle class men were given the vote but not working class men. Without the vote they could not persuade the government to help them so after 1832 many working class men and women set up groups and collected signatures for petitions that demanded a change in the political system, the demand for change where writer as a charter and the people who supported this were called chartists. The charter included, Universal male suffrage, secret ballot. Annual elections, payment of MP’s, No property qualifications for MP’s and all constituencies to have equal number of vote. What was on the charter did not help get votes for women but eventually working class men were allowed the vote. Women achieved no equality to men.
Before the First World War women did not have equality in term of Domestic service. Factory work was the most common job for a woman, if a woman wanted a paid job it was most likely that she would become a servant. Five times as many women worked as servants than in textile factories In 1750 these had been as many men servants as women, but men found that they could earn higher wages and have greater freedom if they took jobs on factories. Domestic service was seen as a suitable job for women. Some women worked in the houses of the very rich, and some became “maid of all work” doing all jobs done in larger households with many servants. Emmeline Pankhurst she wanted equal rights and the vote for women and also better conditions for poor women Emmeline started campaigns and attended women’s suffrage. To an extent women had achieved equality because new opportunities arise but it was not complete because women were still being paid less and had to stop work once getting married.
Before the First World War women did not have equality in terms of new opportunities. These new opportunities were new places of work. They could work as a teacher, they could work in a shop as a shop assistant they could do clerical work or work in nursing. There were good points about teaching it meant that educated women could work and that three quarters of women were teaching but there were bad points you must stay single if you were a teacher the top jobs were done by men women were paid less and if you were married you weren’t allowed to work. The positive points about shop work is that it was seen as “better class” and they got paid £1 a week the bad points is that they had to work 80 hours a week and the had to stop work once they got married. The good points about clerical work was that there was plenty of work for women and that it was not as tiring as nursing or teaching but the bad points were that when you were married you had to leave you were paid less than men and sometimes you were not allowed out of lunch. Nursing was a good opportunity for women but you had to leave if you were married and top jobs were given to men, women were also paid less. There was still no equality to men because women were paid less in all jobs and had to leave once they got married.
After looking at all evidence I think that before the First World War equality in Britain did not exist. Nevertheless there was some progress the greatest progress was made by Legal status I think this because many new laws were introduced that protested women a bit more in 1857 the matrimonial causes act was set up in 1870 the married Women’s property act was introduced.