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Just before Christmas 2005, Frances Stojilkovic was offered what sounded like free money. She was working as a carer, providing in-home assistance to elderly and disabled people.
就在2005年圣诞节前夕，弗朗西丝·斯托吉尔科维奇得到了一笔听起来像是白给的钱。她是一名护工，为老年人和残疾人提供居家帮助。
The letter she received, along with 11,000 other women working for Glasgow city council, told Stojilkovic she was entitled to compensation resulting from wage disparity between men and women.
斯托吉尔科维奇（以及其他1.1万名就职于格拉斯哥市议会的女性）收到的这封信说，她有权获得由于男女工资差异而产生的补偿金。
This was the first time most of the women had heard that they were being paid less than their male counterparts -- but what drew the attention of Stojilkovic and her friends was the promise of a cash injection.
这是大多数女性第一次听说她们的薪酬低于男性--但引起斯托吉尔科维奇和她的朋友们注意的是将给她们一笔钱的承诺。
“It was a carrot dangling before Christmas. Everyone wanted to have something for their kids,” she told me recently.
“那是圣诞节前悬挂着的胡萝卜。每个人都想给自己的孩子买点东西，”她最近告诉我。
Stojilkovic is a no-nonsense woman, born and bred in Glasgow. When she got the letter, she was in her early 40s, and had been working as a home carer for about a year.
斯托吉尔科维奇在格拉斯哥出生和长大，是一个干练务实的女人。她收到这封信时40出头，已经做了一年左右的家庭护工工作。
She loved the job, and was conscious of its importance – sometimes she was the only person someone spoke to that day. But it did not pay well. Many of Stojilkovic’s colleagues, especially the single mothers, worked multiple jobs to make ends meet: night shifts cleaning or weekends in retail.
她热爱这份工作，并意识到这份工作的重要性--有时她是客户那天唯一可以说说话的人。但这份工作的报酬并不高。斯托吉尔科维奇的许多同事，特别是单身母亲，为了维持生计要打好几份工：上夜班做清洁或周末做零售工作。
She considered herself lucky because she and her husband both had jobs – he worked in restaurants – so they had two incomes. But she still worked a lot of overtime, and weeks would go by when she and her husband saw little of each other.
她认为自己很幸运，因为她和丈夫都有工作（他在餐馆工作），所以他们有两份收入。但她仍然经常加班，她和丈夫常常好几个星期都见不到几次面。
Stojilkovic was excited at the prospect of a payout. Having done the job for a year, she was told, she was entitled to 2,800 pounds.
斯托吉尔科维奇对可能获得的这一大笔钱感到兴奋。她做了一年护工，听说可以获得2800英镑。
The compensation package, negotiated behind the scenes between Glasgow city council and the unions, had strict limits. The maximum amount anyone would receive was 9,000 pounds.
格拉斯哥市议会和工会私下谈判的补偿方案有多项严格限制。任何人可以获得的最高金额是9000英镑。
But some of her colleagues who had worked as carers for 10 or 20 years wondered if this sold them short. Stojilkovic remembers that their managers always had the same response: “Yous are being greedy. It’s a lot of money.”
但她的一些做了十年、二十年护理员的同事想知道，9000英镑的补偿金是否低估了她们的价值。斯托吉尔科维奇记得，她们的经理总是有同样的回答：“你们太贪心了。这是一大笔钱。
The letter told the women that if they didn’t take the money, they had the right to pursue claims through employment tribunals with private lawyers, but warned “you could end up with nothing”.
这封信告诉这些女性，如果她们不收下这笔钱，她们有权通过设有私人律师的劳工法庭提起诉讼索赔，还警告称“你们可能最终一分钱都拿不到”。
As instructed by the letter, Stojilkovic made her way to a leisure centre in town where she would receive “independent, impartial legal advice”.
按照这封信的指示，斯托吉尔科维奇前往镇上的一个休闲中心，在那里，她将接受“独立、公正的法律建议”。
In return for the one-off lump sum, the women, who mostly worked in care and education, were required to sign paperwork giving up their right to make further equal pay claims.
为了得到一次性支付的补偿金，这些主要在护理和教育行业工作的女性被要求签署文件，放弃进一步提出同工同酬要求的权利。
