The 1975 Sex Discrimination Act (SDA) didn’t immediately bring full equality for women. A new donation of materials to FAN collected by Bridget Robson contains press cuttings relating to the case of Marianne Schmidt, who was sacked by a Leeds bookshop in 1976 for wearing trousers. Marianne took a case of sex discrimination to an Employment Tribunal, but it ruled that since men did not have a choice of wearing trousers or a skirt there was no basis for comparison under the SDA. Marianne appealed, but lost.
Bridget’s collection also contains documents and photographs relating to her extensive peace activism, including photographs of her journey with the Red Lorry Women for Peace delivering donated supplies to former Yugoslavia in the early 1990s. Details in the Bridget Robson Collection.