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Referring to its previous direct request, the Committee notes the information supplied by the Government in its report, including the attached statistical data, court decisions and documentation.

1. The Committee notes from the statistical data supplied from 1991 studies that, in the private sector, in 1989 the average income of men was higher, in many cases considerably higher, than that of women, even where women have the same educational qualification as men. These statistics also indicate that the disparity between the average income of men and women increased from 1987 to 1989 and that women earn less than men because more women are engaged in part-time employment or in lower-paid jobs (e.g. in textiles, 92 per cent of workers are women, whereas in the petrol industry 94 per cent of workers are men).

As to the public service (Angestellten), the statistics indicate that in 1989 the average gross income of male public servants was significantly higher than that of female public servants. In the civil service (Beamten), however, the average gross income in 1989 of females was a fraction more than that of males.

The Committee requests the Government to continue supplying up-to-date statistics on the average incomes of men and women in both the private and public sectors. It also requests the Government to provide information on the measures that have been taken or contemplated to discern the reasons for the earnings gap between men and women and to redress the causes that are a result of discrimination apparently based on sex.

2. The Committee notes that on 1 February 1991 the Equal Treatment Committee was transferred from the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs to the Federal Chancellery (the Federal Minister of Women's Affairs). The Committee also notes that between 1979 and 1990 the Equal Treatment Committee had brought six cases against employers out of 18 complaints alleging wage discrimination and that the remaining cases were settled. It requests the Government to continue to provide information on the outcome of claims concerning discrimination in the fixing of remuneration, including copies of decisions rendered by the Vienna Labour and Social Welfare Tribunal.

3. The Committee also notes that from the passage of the Act in 1979 until the end of 1990 no employer has been asked for a report pursuant to section 6 of the Equality of Treatment Act (non-compliance with the recommendations of the Equal Treatment Committee in specific cases against employers). It again asks the Government to indicate whether the Equal Treatment Committee has exercised its power to request an employer suspected of non-observance of the principle of equal treatment to submit a report in this respect.

4. The Committee notes the summary of the 1987 case in which the Vienna Labour and Social Welfare Tribunal, affirmed by the Higher Land Court of Vienna, ruled that an employee may contest his or her dismissal pursuant to section 105 of the Labour Constitutional Act (Arbeitsverfassungsgesetz), even if the grounds for appealing the dismissal are not obviously warranted. It asks the Government to inform it in future reports of any other proceedings concerning wage discrimination based on sex brought under section 105 of the Labour Constitutional Act.