But a new fly-on-the wall documentary shows just how much progress has been made in women’s rights as a group of modern women are taken back in time to work on the factory floor – with some shocking consequences.
It is 100 years since British women won the vote and 50 years since female machinists at the Ford car factory in Dagenham first demanded equal pay.
To mark the anniversaries, the BBC has painstakingly reconstructed a clothing factory in the Welsh Valleys and staffed it with a cross-section of modern working women, from a mum and her two daughters to a teenager struggling to land a permanent job. The women get a taste of life over three decades, the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s.
Starting in 1968, viewers will get to see the workforce producing pink nylon petticoats back when Britain was a manufacturing powerhouse, producing 85 per cent of all high-street clothes. An astonishing 34 per cent of the population worked on a production line in the 1960s and many of them were women.
But they endured rampant sexism and pay inequality, and were denied basic rights – which is why the factories were at the forefront of a change in British society, with women the unsung heroes who led the charge.
My parents and Jason’s parents and their parents before them worked in the factories
In episode one of the series, Back In Time For The Factory, we meet Emma Brabon and her daughters, 19-year-old Tamara and Angelea, 22, who go beyond the factory walls to experience life in 1968.
During the four weeks of filming, the Brabon family lived in a typical terraced factory worker’s house, which evoked childhood memories for Emma and her husband Jason.
“My parents and Jason’s parents and their parents before them worked in the factories,” Emma says.
“Jason remembers his grandfather coming home from work, sitting reading the paper, then he’d have a bath and go to bed. He would not lift a finger. For the four weeks of filming I had to do all the housework and it wound me up. I was shattered after nine-hour days at the factory.”
In 2018, Jason is a modern, hands-on dad to his daughters and the couple’s 13-year-old son Mason.
“It was totally alien for him because he comes home from work before me and starts getting dinner on the table,” explains Emma, 43, who is an education and training coordinator for Rhondda Cynon Taff County Borough Council.
AT THE SHARP END: Sisters Tamara, left, and Angelea with mum Emma on the production line (Image: BBC/WALL TO WALL MEDIA LTD/WARREN ORCHAR)
Emma’s frustrations aren’t limited to life on the home front. Like all the women in the series she is shocked by the working conditions in the mock factory, Valley Wear.
“My mother-in-law always has a smile on her face when she talks about working in the factory,” she says.
“She never talks about the inequality, the lack of health and safety regulations. But she also knew that men earned a higher wage for the same job and the women were treated differently. Back then you couldn’t do anything about it.”
Fifty years ago, just being pregnant was enough to get women the sack. In the show Cass Sheehan, one of the factory’s top machinists, is astonished to find a note pinned to her locker informing her that because she is six months pregnant she has been dismissed.
“It came completely out of the blue,” says Cass, 37, a language teacher from Cardiff who has three other children.
“One minute I was a skilled machinist, enjoying sewing and the camaraderie and then I was no longer wanted, out on my ear, and I took it personally.”
The reality of being on the production line is a rude awakening for 17-year-old Chelsea Covington, who finds the sewing work difficult.
“I know it was a mock life but I didn’t enjoy it that much,” says Chelsea, who lives with her parents and two older sisters in Gwent.
“It was cold and the chairs were rock hard. You had to work for eight hours. You had breaks but the working conditions for women were shocking. There’s no way we’d put up with that now.”
But there is an even bigger shock in store for the women when they open their pay packets and see that some of them are being paid less than half what the men earn. Angelea, who works as a machinist, receives £4 compared with £10 paid to Alex, who prepares the Valley Wear packing boxes.
Whereas Angelea’s position is classed as unskilled, Alex receives a higher wage because he – like most male employees – is given skilled worker status.
This injustice was the basis for the walkout by machinists at Dagenham in 1968, which eventually brought the Ford plant to a standstill.
RUDE AWAKENING: Chelsea, 17, found the going hard (Image: BBC )
“Those Dagenham women risked everything to improve the situation,” Cass says.
“Hats off to them because they put themselves in a precarious position. In 1968, women were way down the pecking order and it’s not even that long ago.”
Presenter and narrator Alex Jones brings in a team of experts, including former Dagenham strikers and factory machinists who, with the help of TV footage from the time, give the women first-hand accounts of what life was like.
“I had a sit-down with one of the ladies who used to work in a factory and it was a real eye-opener. She made me believe that I can be whatever I want to be and that I can follow my dreams,” Chelsea says.
“I’d love to be a wedding planner and she really has inspired me to fulfil my dreams.”
In one segment of the show the Brabon family is seen watching an episode of the weekly documentary series Whicker’s World.
“There’s this young woman talking about how she earns money just to make herself look pretty to get a rich husband,” Emma says.
“My daughters are strong and independent and don’t understand why the women accepted it. Men were the breadwinners and women just worked to buy the extra luxuries.”
TRAILBLAZERS: Dagenham women protest in 1968 (Image: BOB AYLOTT/KEYSTONE/GETTY)
Long hours and tough conditions they may have been, but factory life also engendered strong bonds of friendship among the female workforce.
“We had to hand over our mobile phones and I didn’t want to at first, but it helped me get into the experience,” Chelsea says.
“We all sat together at the table during tea breaks and communicated. I learnt so much about the other women and understand how back in the day they became really close.”
“Some of the girls brought in cards, others were knitting and we were all chatting,” Cass recalls.
“We found out about each other’s lives and had a giggle.”
“I have made friendships for life,” Emma adds.
“My mother used to say the same thing, that she worked with these women for 30-40 years and they were so close.”
This sense of community defined Emma’s childhood: “I have really happy memories of growing up with my mum’s friends from the factory. I remember playing on the doorstep and the factory bus would arrive at 5pm and floods of people would get off.”
In a unique position to compare 1968 and 2018, the women all conclude that, despite the camaraderie and abundant employment, they wouldn’t swap their modern lives.
“If the Valleys still had factories, I don’t think I could stand to work there,” Chelsea says.
“But I have learned so much from the experience. I am proud of the women from back in the day; us women do have a voice and we should speak our minds.”
“This experience taught me how accepting of situations I am and that shouldn’t be the case,” says Cass, whose baby, Ellie Beth, was born in July.
“Just now I get 39 weeks maternity pay but is that good enough? We have made a lot of progress since 1968 but the key thing here is choice.”
It’s a sentiment shared by Emma.
“My sister left school on the Friday and started work at the factory on the Monday,” she says.
“I consciously made a decision to do something different. If the factories had still been around when I left school I would not have wanted to follow in my family’s footsteps. I changed the mould.”
Back In Time For The Factory, tomorrow on BBC Two at 8pm.