A report by the Equal Opportunities Commission has revealed that more than 86,000 women in Northern Ireland are earning less than £4 sterling an hour, and that more than 70 per cent of low-paid workers in the region are female.

The report, called "Women and Low Pay", says that a large percentage of women work in traditionally low-paid, usually part-time, jobs in the hotel and restaurant business, or in similarly low-paid jobs in the public sector such as ancillary health workers.

The author of the report, Mr Ron Keegan, said the relatively low pay of part-time workers, combined with the number of women in such work, explained why women made up such a high percentage of the low-paid.

"The lack of a minimum wage, the abolition of the Wages Councils, ineffective equal pay legislation, and gender segregation at work have all played their part," Mr Keegan said.