MINISTERS should urge television programme-makers and advertisers to portray more women in traditional men’s jobs, according to a report commissioned by Tony Blair published tomorrow.

The Women and Work Commission report will recommend “non-stereotypical” characters for TV soap operas and commercials in order to encourage better role models for schoolgirls.

It is one of several proposals in the long-awaited report, which was set up to tackle the pay gap and different promotion prospects between the sexes. However, while Blair will welcome most of the report, Downing Street officials are likely to reject the plan to demand more female role models in television shows as “too politically correct”.

The commission, chaired by the Labour peer Baroness Prosser, has found that girls are still being steered towards “stereotypical” subjects at school which lead them into lower-paid careers.

Women also lose out when they return to work after having babies, and are often forced into part-time jobs that underuse their skills, the report finds.

It suggests that the country is losing out to the tune of between £15 billion and £23 billion a year because of the barriers women face. Putting women into the jobs they are capable of would boost the economy significantly.

The report, to be launched by Blair and Gordon Brown tomorrow alongside Prosser, concludes that while girls outperform boys at school that advantage disappears once they get into the workplace.

Women’s median full-time earnings are 13% less per hour than those of men. The mean earnings gap is even bigger, 17%. Many women are forced by family responsibilities into part-time jobs, which pay 32% less per hour than equivalent full-time posts.

The commission will call for better vocational training and work experience for girls, to steer them towards the traditional male bastions of the job market. It also wants to highlight “exemplar” companies, which have achieved business success by promoting women.

The report also recommends working with firms to increase the range of jobs that can be done on a part-time or flexible basis, and adapting childcare and employment programmes to help women returning to work after having children.

Early action in response to the report is expected in Brown’s March 22 budget. The chancellor read the report last week and is said to have been impressed.

He is expected in the budget to double the number of skills coaches available under government programmes, and target them at women with low skills. Brown will also provide extra funding for the existing Train to Gain scheme, which the commission praises, encouraging employers to provide extra training for women, particularly those with low skills.

New financial incentives will be provided for jobcentre advisers to steer women away from jobs with low pay and low prospects and into work with career progression.

The commission’s report was delayed by several months because of wrangling between trade union and business representatives on the body. Its report will spare firms draconian new legislation introducing mandatory pay audits, but the commission favours companies with more than 50 employees appointing “equality representatives” to monitor differences in pay between the sexes.

It will also back the introduction of “class action” legal claims, common in America, which would allow one woman to represent a whole group who felt discriminated against in a test case.

Ruth Silver, a member of the commission, said schoolgirls faced a “systemic closure of options . . . what we are looking for is a different attitude and skill set among girls”.

Academic research shows that arts graduates tend to finish up poorer than those who leave education after taking A-levels.

Graduates in subjects such as English, history and foreign languages earn up to 7% less over their lifetimes than adults with two A-levels, a Warwick University study found in 2003.

Far more women than men study arts subjects. According to figures from the Higher Education Statistics Agency, three times more women than men do teacher training at university; twice as many women study social studies and languages; 50% more women study creative arts and design and 30% more study history or philosophy. By contrast, six times more men than women study engineering, three times as many study computer science, 60% more study maths and 50% more study physics or chemistry.

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